Disclaimer: This article is for educational and informational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. I am simply documenting my own read of the market and my own trading plan for the day.

This is the one morning on the calendar I mark in advance every quarter, and gold knows it too. Every chart in front of me right now, from the 30-minute up to the monthly, is telling a slightly different story, and by this evening the Fed will have flattened most of that noise into one clear direction.

Opening

Gold is trading around $4,320-4,330 this morning, up roughly 0.6-0.7% on the day after a chop of a session yesterday. That puts it comfortably off the five-week low it touched earlier this week near $4,250-4,260, and it’s the third session in a row where buyers have shown up right at the point sellers expected them to disappear. Yesterday’s close was around $4,294, so this morning’s bounce is real, even if it’s still modest against the scale of the pullback we’ve seen from last week’s highs near $4,690.

Fundamental Landscape

Everything else today is a footnote to one event. The Fed announces its rate decision at 20:00 GMT (14:00 ET), with the Summary of Economic Projections and dot plot released at the same time, followed by Chair Kevin Warsh’s press conference at 20:30 GMT. Markets are pricing a 25bp hike to 3.75-4.00% at somewhere around 92-94%, which if confirmed would be the first hike since 2023. Warsh, ironically appointed with a dovish reputation, turned hawkish after his Jackson Hole remarks, and the data since (hotter core CPI, a stubborn PPI print) has done nothing to talk him out of it.

Before that, Retail Sales for August lands at 14:30 GMT, with consensus around 0.8% after July’s -0.6% contraction. A strong print reinforces the dollar and yields ahead of the Fed and could pressure gold lower into the decision; a soft one could give gold a bit of breathing room. The dollar index is sitting just under 99.4-99.7, and the 10-year Treasury yield is hovering right at that psychologically loaded 5% mark, both of which have been the main headwinds capping gold’s recovery attempts this week.

Underneath all of that, oil remains elevated on continued Middle East supply disruption, and that’s the real transmission mechanism I’m watching: rather than geopolitics pushing safe-haven flows into gold directly, it’s pushing oil higher, which feeds inflation, which keeps the Fed’s hand forced toward restrictive policy. My reading is that this is why gold has struggled to catch a real safe-haven bid this week despite the backdrop. Structurally, though, the floor underneath the market still looks solid to me — ETF holdings are at record highs and central banks bought close to 289 tonnes last quarter, so any dip here is landing on genuine underlying demand rather than an empty order book.

Asia & Europe Sessions

The Asian session defended the $4,250-4,280 zone convincingly, and London has carried that into a steady grind higher through the morning. What stands out to me on the intraday charts is the higher low forming against a bit of RSI divergence — momentum on the sell side looks tired even where price hasn’t fully confirmed it yet. It’s not a strong bullish signal on its own, but it’s the kind of setup that makes me want to see how price behaves into the New York open before drawing firm conclusions.

Technical Analysis

Zooming out, the bigger picture is still corrective. The daily and weekly charts show a market that ran hard into a multi-week high above $4,690 and has been unwinding that move since, and my own longer-term charts still read as a downtrend that hasn’t been broken yet. Where it gets more interesting is the shorter end: the 30-minute and hourly picture has flipped constructive, with price reclaiming ground it lost over the past few sessions.

To me, that split between “bearish on the higher timeframes, recovering on the lower ones” is exactly what I’d expect the morning before a binary macro event. Nobody wants to commit to the next leg until the Fed removes the uncertainty, so price is doing what it always does in that vacuum — chopping around the pivot while positioning stays light.

Key Levels

  • Immediate resistance: $4,328-4,332 (today’s pivot and first reaction zone), then $4,340-4,341 (today’s high so far)
  • Stronger resistance: $4,350-4,360, then the more significant structural ceiling at $4,400-4,405
  • Immediate support: $4,319-4,323 (today’s pivot support)
  • Main defended zone: $4,250-4,280, which has held on every test this week
  • Deeper support: $4,228-4,230, then $4,160 as an extended downside target if the floor gives way

My Gold Outlook Today

My base case is that we stay range-bound between roughly $4,280 and $4,340 through the European morning and into Retail Sales, with the real move only arriving after 20:00 GMT. If the Fed delivers the hike with a hawkish dot plot — more increases signalled ahead — I’d expect gold to give back today’s bounce fairly quickly and head back toward $4,250-4,230. If it’s a “hawkish hike, dovish guidance” combination, the kind of one-and-done signal, I think gold could actually catch a relief bid and work back up toward $4,350-4,400, since so much of the hike itself is already priced in.

The scenario I’m watching for as my invalidation point is a surprise hold — low probability in my view, maybe somewhere in the 7-13% range, but if it happens I’d expect a sharp move higher, potentially clearing $4,400 quickly. Whatever happens, I’m treating the Warsh press conference at 20:30 GMT as the moment that actually sets the tone, not the statement itself. In July, gold moved over 2% in the space of minutes once the Q&A got going, and I have no reason to expect today to be calmer.

What I’m Watching Today

  • 14:30 GMT — Retail Sales: a strong beat adds pressure on gold into the Fed; a miss could hand gold a head start before the main event
  • 20:00 GMT — Fed rate decision and dot plot: the hike itself is largely priced in, so the projections matter more than the headline number
  • 20:30 GMT — Warsh’s press conference: historically the real volatility window, and where I expect the day’s actual direction to be decided
  • Oil and the DXY through the day: any fresh escalation in the Middle East, or a break either side of the 99.4-99.7 dollar range, will shape how much room gold has to move either way