Gold surged last time this happened.
Gold Surged Last Time This Happened
August 31 (King World News) – Nomi Prins: At Jackson Hole, Fed chair Warsh hinted at a rate hike, and gold and silver gave back their late-week gains. But the last time the Fed hiked a total of 525 basis points, gold barely moved before more than doubling. A quarter point won’t dent $40 trillion in debt, record central-bank buying, or silver’s five-year deficit.
Fiat Currencies
Ole Hansen, Head of Commodity Strategy at SaxoBank: The COT update on forex covering the week to 25 August captured the aftermath of the US Treasury’s bond buyback announcement, which initially weakened the dollar before some buying returned later in the reporting period. Overall, the Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index ended the reporting week down around 0.8%, before fully reversing the buyback-driven decline by last Friday following Kevin Warsh’s hawkish speech at Jackson Hole.
Against this backdrop, the initial reaction was unsurprisingly one of dollar-long liquidation, with speculators turning net buyers of most of the eight IMM currency futures tracked in this report.
The main exception was the Japanese yen. Overall, the aggregate speculative dollar long was cut by USD 8.3 billion to USD 27.6 billion, extending a sharp reversal from the record long of around USD 50 billion reached just one month earlier.
At the individual currency level, the euro short was cut by 38% after speculators bought a net 22.7k contracts, equivalent to USD 3.3 billion, leaving the net short at USD 5.3 billion. The Canadian dollar saw its net short reduced by 23%, or USD 2.7 billion, following net buying of 36.6k contracts. The Swiss franc and New Zealand dollar also attracted sizeable short covering, each seeing their respective dollar-equivalent shorts reduced by around USD 1.1 billion.
Sterling and the Australian dollar also saw modest net buying, although both remained firmly net short, while the Mexican peso continued to stand out as the only currency among the eight carrying a speculative net long against the dollar. Its relative strength continues to be supported by favourable rate differentials – the same dynamic, but in reverse, that continues to weigh on the Japanese yen.
Going against the broader trend, the yen saw net selling for a second consecutive week, with speculators selling 10.4k contracts and lifting the net short to 63.3k contracts, or around USD 5 billion. The divergence highlights the continued importance of relative rate expectations, with the still-wide US-Japan yield differential limiting the yen’s ability to benefit from the broader bout of dollar weakness…
Listen to the greatest Egon von Greyerz audio interview ever
by CLICKING HERE OR ON THE IMAGE BELOW.
Commodities
In commodities, the latest reporting week to 25 August covered the period following the surprise US Treasury bond buyback announcement, which triggered a rush into hard assets, particularly precious metals, while the accompanying dollar weakness provided broader support across the commodity complex. It was also a week in which the geopolitical temperature rose in and around the Black Sea region while a temporary easing in the Middle East contributed to an increase in crude flows through the Strait of Hormuz and a partial unwinding of the oil market’s geopolitical risk premium.
During the week, the Bloomberg Commodity Index rose by 1.1%, with strong gains across agriculture excluding livestock and, not least, precious metals, while industrial metals also advanced. These gains more than offset losses across the energy sector. Speculators responded by cutting length in Brent crude, soybean oil and livestock, while most other markets saw net buying. Once again, the strongest appetite was concentrated in grains and softs, a sector that in a matter of weeks has moved from being relatively under-owned to carrying an increasingly sizeable speculative long.
Gold
Elsewhere, the positioning response to strong gains across the investment metals was relatively muted. Gold rose 6.2% during the reporting week, while the managed-money net long increased by just 4% to 151.3k contracts, leaving it close to its one-year high.
Silver
Silver and platinum saw larger percentage increases albeit from considerably smaller starting positions.
This suggests that the strong price response to the Treasury announcement was not accompanied by an equally aggressive build-up in futures positioning, potentially pointing to demand coming from other sources as well.
On Friday, gold led the precious metals sector sharply lower following Kevin Warsh’s hawkish Jackson Hole speech on Friday, in which he pledged to fight inflation, lifting expectations that the Fed could raise rates before year-end. The weakness extended into today’s session after bullion closed back below its 200-day moving average on Friday, currently at USD 4,528, forcing traders to reassess the short-term technical outlook. The next key support is around USD 4,328, the 50% retracement of the August rally. Focus on the dollar and bond yields considering the longer-term fiscal challenge posed by US debt at around USD 40 trillion has not disappeared.
Agriculture
Across the ten major grain and soft commodity futures tracked in this report, the combined managed-money net long has now in the past two weeks surged by 546k contracts, the fastest pace on record, with the total rising above 1.1 million contracts, the highest in more than four years and representing a nominal exposure of more than USD 40 billion. The speed of the turnaround has been particularly striking, with the combined position having been close to neutral only a few months ago.
The buying was led by corn, where funds added a net 126k contracts to lift the net long to 376.5k contracts, the highest in more than four years. Soybeans also attracted sizeable demand, with the net long rising by 46.6k contracts to 198.3k, while sugar saw another 55.7k contracts of net buying, lifting the position to a fresh two-year high of 207.1k contracts. Cotton also reached a two-year high at 95.8k contracts, while the Kansas City wheat net long rose to 44.1k contracts, a four-year high.
One notable exception was CBOT wheat, where speculators, despite some short covering, still held a net short position of more than 100,000 contracts by last Tuesday. This helps explain why prices jumped more than 11% in the days that followed, as short sellers retreated on news that Russian exports had slowed sharply and disruptions to Ukrainian shipments increasingly threatened not only current exports but also future planting. The fundamental backdrop has therefore become considerably less comfortable for remaining wheat shorts.
Key points:
- Our weekly Commitment of Traders update tracks hedge fund positioning across forex and commodity futures during the week ending 25 August 2026.
- Dollar longs cut after the Treasury buyback: Speculators reduced the aggregate dollar long by USD 8.3 billion to USD 27.6 billion, led by short covering in the euro, Canadian dollar, Swiss franc and New Zealand dollar, while yen selling continued amid unfavourable US-Japan rate differentials.
- Agriculture length surges at a record pace: The managed-money net long across ten major grains and softs jumped at the fastest pace on record, with corn, sugar, cotton and Kansas wheat reaching multi-year positioning highs, while CBOT wheat remained net short ahead of an 11% price surge as worsening Black Sea supply risks forced shorts to retreat.
- Metals and energy positioning diverge: Gold futures buying remained relatively restrained despite a 6.2% rally, while copper length eased from elevated levels. In energy, funds cut Brent longs by 11% as increased Hormuz flows reduced the Middle East risk premium.
Man Who Correctly Predicted Gold Would Skyrocket In 2024
To listen to Gerald Celente, who correctly predicted at the beginning of 2024 that gold prices would skyrocket, discuss what he expects from the gold market today CLICK HERE OR ON THE IMAGE BELOW.
JUST RELEASED: GOLD & SILVER!
To listen to Alasdair Macleod discuss this week’s wild trading in gold and silver and what to expect next CLICK HERE OR ON THE IMAGE BELOW.
ALSO RELEASED!
OWN GOLD: US Annual Interest Expense Highest Since 1991! CLICK HERE.
Celente – US Total Debt Is Really $126 Trillion, Gold Is Headed A Lot Higher CLICK HERE.
SILVER SKYROCKET? Ignore Pullback, Almost Nobody Long The Silver Futures Market CLICK HERE.
Despite Fed Babble, $15,000 Gold And $300-$500 Silver Targets Intact CLICK HERE.
The Great Rebalancing Will Fuel The Gold Bull Market For Years To Come CLICK HERE.
A Look At Real World Inflation As M2 Money Supply Grows At A Rapid Rate CLICK HERE.
GOLD: This Stock Has Been On A Tear, Plus Look At What Just Hit Highest Level In A Decade CLICK HERE.
Gold Close Back Above $4,700 For The First Time In 3 1/2 Years CLICK HERE.
US May Go On A Massive Gold Buying Spree Sending Price To $20,000 CLICK HERE.
This Is Why Analysts Are Now Predicting $10,000-$20,000 Gold CLICK HERE.
US Now Desperate To Manipulate Gold Price To $17,000-$20,000 Or Higher CLICK HERE.
Legend Rob Arnott Just Issued This Warning To The US Government CLICK HERE.
WHAT A WEEK: Gold Futures Hit $4,660, Silver Futures $70! CLICK HERE.
Dollar Tanks, Gold Soars, But Take A Look At This… CLICK HERE.
God Help Us: This Global Crisis Is About To Unleash An Even More Terrifying One CLICK HERE.
Gold Begins Move To $6,000 After US Treasury Bond Purchase Announcement (QE: Money To Be Printed By Fed) CLICK HERE.
Important Update: Gold, Silver, Miners And Commodities CLICK HERE.
This Just Hit Multi-Decade Highs But Here Is The Big Surprise CLICK HERE.
CRASH ALERT: US Stock Market Sees 8th Hindenburg Omen As Gold & Silver Surge CLICK HERE.
© 2026 by King World News®. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. However, linking directly to the articles is permitted and encouraged.
