Gold surged 65% during the last year of 2025 while recording 12% during the first three weeks of 2026. It’s now hit an all-time high of USD 4,888/- before settling at USD 4,832/-.
Gold price held key support at the 50-day EMA and 200-day EMA, with Goldman Sachs targeting USD 5,400 by year-end.
Goldman Sachs increased its 2026 gold forecast by USD 500/- from USD 4,900/- to USD 5,400/- per ounce. They were citing central bank buying and private-sector diversification.
Gold has delivered one of the most powerful runs in recent history. The key question now is, how high would gold climb? Also, gold may hit a ceiling of USD 5,000 per ounce. The yellow metal still seems to be in a clear uptrend. The spike was even after setting fresh all-time highs and pulling back slightly.
Over the past year, gold surged about 65%. During the first three weeks of 2026, it has inflated by a further 12%, briefly testing the USD 4,888/- area per ounce to set new historical records. On Thursday, 22 January 2026. Gold is currently moving slightly lower, trading around USD 4,827. From a technical perspective, it seems more like a pause inside a structural bull market than the start of a top.
At its core, the gold price increase can be summarised as three overlapping forces:
Structural demand
Macro hedging
A strong technical uptrend that keeps attracting followers to the trend
From a fundamental perspective, a major global investment bank, Goldman Sachs, has just released its end-of-2026 gold price forecast from USD 4,900/- to USD 5,400/- per ounce. This explicitly cites the private sector & emerging-market central bank diversification into gold as the main driver.
The bank assumes that these buyers are diversifying their investments privately. They hedge global policy risks and have driven the upside surprise, which will not liquidate in 2026. These effectively lift the whole path of its price profile.
At the same time, it expects Western ETF holdings to increase as the Federal Reserve cuts its rates. It sees central bank purchases averaging around 60 tonnes during 2026. Reserve managers now continue shifting out of pure dollar exposure into bullion.
That institutional view tends to be compatible with how professional market analysts describe the current phase. A senior market analyst at XS.com MENA, Rania Gule, calls this a delicate phase that reflects a fragile balance between geopolitical, economic, and monetary factors. Gule stressed that gold has managed to recover early-year dips and hold above USD 4,800. It even approached USD 4,925 despite a slowdown in momentum.
Gule added that in her view, this move is not a mere short-term spike but a sign that investors increasingly see gold as a strategic asset to be bought on dips. Even when the classic safe-haven narrative temporarily waned, this continued to hold true.
The message is straightforward: gold is a strong, dynamic uptrend. Recent price performances fit cleanly into a bullish structure.
Gold has temporarily met resistance around USD 4,850. However, underneath that ceiling sits an entire ladder of support that can absorb a technical connection. The first short-term support is a gap around USD 4,650/-, which got reflected between Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s sessions. Slightly lower, USD 4,550/- may be the next key level. This range is the zone of highs tested at the end of December, as well as earlier during October.
The main support zone is around USD 4,360. The price currently overlaps with the 50-day exponential moving average. This vicinity is the area that acts as the primary defence line for the existing uptrend.
If that USD 4,360/- region were to break cleanly. This points towards a deeper pullback into the USD 3,900–4,000 band for each ounce. This range is a psychologically important round area that also coincides with the volatility envelopes. This circle was drawn around the price during early November ’25.
