Gold ended October with its worst October since 2008: spot gold fell 3.6% to $3,875.55 an ounce on Friday 30 October, a one-year low, and lost 6.8% over the month, according to Investing.com. On Monday 2 November dip buyers returned, and spot gold was up 1.9% at $3,945 at 9:20 a.m. New York time, the same source reported.
Financial analyst Ruslan Averin reads the October slide as a rate story, not the end of gold's role in savings: the Fed's path, not the dollar, drove the price, while central banks keep buying.
The numbers: Friday close and Monday rebound
| Market | Level | Move | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Spot gold, Friday 30 October close | $3,875.55 | −3.6% on the day, −6.8% in October | Investing.com |
| COMEX gold futures, Friday 30 October settlement | $3,884.90 | −3.6% on the day, −7.3% in October | Investing.com |
| Spot gold, Monday 2 November, 9:20 a.m. ET | $3,945 | +1.9% | Investing.com |
| Spot silver, Monday 2 November, 9:20 a.m. ET | $50.84 | +3.1% | Investing.com |
| LBMA PM gold price, 2026 high | $5,405 | January | World Gold Council |
Monday figures are intraday quotes. On Yahoo Finance data, futures set a record close of $5,318.40 on Thursday 29 January; Friday's settlement is about 27% below it and about 10% down for the year.
What moved gold last week
The Federal Reserve held its target range at 3.75–4.00% on Wednesday 28 October in a 10–2 vote. Chair Kevin Warsh said much data remains before the December decision, and markets expect another hike in December after the September increase, the first in over three years, Investing.com reported.
The World Gold Council said on 2 November that gold's weakness "increasingly reflects a repricing of the Fed's expected rate path since the October meeting". It sees leveraged investors as the sellers: COMEX Managed Money positions fell by about 11 tonnes since mid-October and other trader groups by about 70 tonnes.
The dollar was not the trigger: the WGC said the dollar index "remained broadly stable". Gold fell on Friday "despite a sharp selloff in the U.S. dollar", David Morrison of Trade Nation told Investing.com.
Two other forces mattered, according to Investing.com: a slide in US stocks on worries about debt-funded AI spending, which led some investors to sell gold to cover losses, and oil. Iranian attacks on ships in Hormuz kept hike expectations alive; on Monday Marco Rubio's signal that President Trump prefers diplomacy eased energy worries.
Who is buying: central banks, Chinese funds, not US speculators
Central banks reported net purchases of 39 tonnes in August and 170 tonnes year to date, the WGC said on 6 October. Poland leads with 98 tonnes. China added 23 tonnes in September, its largest monthly addition since October 2023, for 63 tonnes in Q3. Russia has sold 56 tonnes this year.
In the WGC's latest Gold Demand Trends, for Q2 2026, central banks bought 288.9 tonnes, up 62% year on year, while gold ETFs lost 45 tonnes. The Q3 edition was not yet posted on the WGC site on Monday 2 November.
Gold-backed ETFs attracted more than 50 tonnes in September, ANZ said, as cited by Investing.com. Chinese gold ETFs grew by 11 tonnes in September to a record 304 tonnes, according to the WGC.
Silver: the same move, amplified
COMEX silver futures closed October at $49.10, down 18.3% for the month and about 57% below their record close of $115.08 on Monday 26 January, on Yahoo Finance data. Silver is more industrial and more volatile, so for savings I treat it as a satellite, not a substitute for gold (silver at $70 in June).
Gold in hryvnia: a smaller fall
The National Bank of Ukraine set the official gold rate for Tuesday 3 November at UAH 177,632.58 per troy ounce, or UAH 5,711.02 per gram. On 1 October it was UAH 6,012.80 per gram and on 31 December 2025 UAH 5,995.88, NBU data show.
In hryvnia gold is down 5.0% since 1 October and 4.8% this year, far less than in dollars, because the official dollar rate rose 7.4%, from UAH 42.3878 at the end of 2025 to UAH 45.5348 for 3 November. More on the currency in the dollar exchange rate forecast.
Ways to hold gold, and what they cost
Bank bars. The cost is the spread. PrivatBank's prices for 2 November:
| Bar | Bank buys, UAH per gram | Bank sells, UAH per gram | Loss on an immediate round trip |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 g | 6,610 | 8,230 | 19.7% |
| 10 g | 6,105 | 6,625 | 7.8% |
| 31.1 g | 6,090 | 6,585 | 7.5% |
| 100 g | 5,950 | 6,455 | 7.8% |
A 100-gram bar sold at UAH 6,455 per gram costs 11.9% more than the NBU rate of UAH 5,767.16 for 2 November. Small bars are the most expensive way in. PrivatBank says bank-metal operations have been available only to its own clients since October 2025.
Metal accounts. Unallocated accounts avoid storage, but the bank's buy and sell rates still apply.
Gold ETFs through a broker. The cost is an annual fee: 0.40% for SPDR Gold Shares (GLD), 0.25% for iShares Gold Trust (IAU) and 0.10% for SPDR Gold MiniShares (GLDM), per StockAnalysis, plus broker commissions and currency conversion. Miners are a leveraged bet (GDX).
How much of savings to keep in gold
There is no official number for households. The closest reference is institutional: pension funds profiled by the WGC on 1 October hold 2% to 5% in gold, from about 2% at Now Pensions to a 5% target at the Dutch fund DPS.
For a Ukrainian saver the comparison is different. The NBU key rate is 16.5% after the 29 October increase, inflation was 10.0% in September and the NBU now expects 12.5% at the end of 2026, so hryvnia deposits pay a real return that gold does not. See deposit rates in Ukraine and inflation and OVDP.
My view: gold is insurance against a currency or banking shock, and its share should be set in advance, not after a record or a crash. I keep a reserve of several months of expenses first, then a single-digit share in gold, rebalanced when it drifts. Ruslan Averin made the same point in a column for sw.org.ua on 2 November: there is no universal proportion that suits everyone. In a column for kiev-pravda.kiev.ua the same day he wrote that buying metal should be part of a long-term financial plan.
Ruslan Averin's columns on this topic
Six columns of 2 November on gold and savings:
- How to protect personal savings from inflation and financial shocks — icz.com.ua, 2 November (in Russian)
- Gold records and a storm in markets: how to rebuild a defensive portfolio — autoblog.kyiv.ua, 2 November (in Russian)
- Gold as insurance against instability: Ruslan Averin on sensible capital allocation — sw.org.ua, 2 November (in Russian)
- How to preserve capital during a global crisis: Ruslan Averin on new investment priorities — medfactor.com.ua, 2 November (in Russian)
- Gold, currencies and investments: Ruslan Averin on strategies for saving money in an unstable economy — kiev-pravda.kiev.ua, 2 November (in Russian)
- Financial security in an age of crises: Ruslan Averin on the role of gold and diversification — just-forum.com, 2 November (in Russian)
What to watch next
- Tuesday 3 November: US midterms; the WGC notes gold reacts to the policies that follow, not to election day (what markets price).
- Wednesday 4 November: the WGC's Gold Market Commentary on where a floor may be.
- Friday 6 November: US October jobs report, 8:30 a.m. New York time.
- Tuesday 10 November: US October CPI.
- Tuesday–Wednesday 8–9 December: the next FOMC meeting, with new projections.
- WGC Q3 2026 Gold Demand Trends: central-bank and ETF totals for July–September.
Related: gold below $4,300 before the Fed hike, gold in June and the NBU raises its rate to 16.5%.