Gold Bulls Watching US Rate Forecasts!

For the upcoming session, there are a few US-based data points that will carry serious weight if we are gauging the country’s economic potential. However, I’m looking at the fundamental backdrop with much more of an eye towards rate projections. Fed speak in particular has thus far picked up where it left off last week. A number of officials have made a concerted effort to warn the market that the path to a terminal rate seems to be higher than they had previous expected, while outspoken hawk James Bullard went so far as to suggest the market was underpricing the risk of a higher rate on Monday. Nevertheless, retail traders seem to be either be negligent or dubious of their signals. Fed Fund futures are little budged from last week and are still pricing in rate cuts in the back half of 2023 – something that even the dovish officials have reiterated they don’t believe will happen. In speculative positioning, we can see the skepticism play out with CFD interest to short gold’s bounce significantly reduced over the past week even though we have not made any higher highs after that November 15th peak.