Gold and Silver Climb on Iran Strikes, Poor Jobs Data

 

Gold and Silver Climb on Iran Strikes, Poor U.S. Employment Data

(Bullion News Network) – Gold and silver prices climbed to end the week on Friday after a somewhat surprising week of middling performances in both markets. Given the outbreak of fresh conflict between the United States and Iran, many analysts expected a stronger flight toward safe haven assets like gold and silver. Instead, the spot price of gold pulled back by more than $230 per troy ounce on Tuesday before gaining and losing around $50/ozt on Wednesday and Thursday, respectively. Gold gained more than $90 per troy ounce on Friday, showing a bit of life after a troubling U.S. employment report published that morning. Silver also gained on Friday, following a similar pattern to gold throughout the trading week before adding approximately $2.25 per troy ounce to close Friday. The gold-silver ratio changed little this past week, gaining 4.28 points on Monday and 2.44 points on Tuesday before losing steam in the second half of the week.

February’s U.S. employment report came back much worse than expected. The United States lost 92,000 jobs in February against a median projection of 50,000 jobs added. This was a major retraction after January’s job report, which saw 126,000 jobs added. The latest sign that the U.S. labor market may be beginning to struggle, Wall Street slid as traders reacted to the new data. The Dow fell by 450 points, logging its worst week in almost a year. Also contributing to struggling stock prices is the rising price of oil. Crude oil topped $90 per barrel on Friday, its highest rate in years. The United States and Israel continued military operations in Iran this week, and none of the leaders involved seem willing to back down.

On Friday, Trump announced that there would be no peace deal with Iran until the country offers “unconditional surrender.” Meanwhile, Israeli strikes continued in Tehran, Iran’s capital city. The conflict began on the 28th of February, when U.S. President Donald Trump announced that the United States military had begun conducting strikes against Iran in cooperation with Israel. Leaders in the Trump administration said that they don’t anticipate that this will become a “forever war,” although Trump himself told reporters earlier this week that he expects the fighting to continue for at least several more weeks.

A combination of rising oil prices, a fresh war in the Middle East, and another troubling signal for the United States job market leaves safe haven assets like gold in an interesting spot. Gold tends to perform well during times of conflict, and the relationship between gold and crude oil prices has been relatively well-established in the past two decades. Gold and silver prices were relatively stable throughout the heavy news week, shrugging off expectations that heightened uncertainty would drive a flight toward safe haven assets. The United States dollar rose to claim its largest weekly gain since 2025 as the U.S. strikes on Iran continued. According to some analysts, low buying activity for the greenback in recent weeks drove investors to buy more USD, a tradeoff that kept a cap on safe haven assets for the time being.

Rate cut expectations were little changed to end the trading week, despite the dour labor market report. CME FedWatch’s projected probability of a rate cut at the Fed’s March 18th meeting closed at 4.5% on Friday, down from 7.4% one week prior and 18.4% on February 6th. The FOMC still seems unlikely to cut rates, despite the cracks emerging in the American market, unless inflation makes more meaningful progress toward the Fed’s longstanding 2% target. Next Friday’s Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) report could serve as a good test as the FOMC’s next meeting approaches.

Gold ended Friday up but lost ground throughout the week, as did silver. The gold-silver ratio gained $2.25 per troy ounce but did little to make up for two consecutive losses on Monday and Tuesday.