Gold breaches $3,800 in record high

Gold climbed to a record above $3,800 an ounce for the first time as precious metals surged, with traders weighing a potential US government shutdown that could delay the release of pivotal jobs data this week, which would cloud the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy path.

Bullion rose as much as 1.4 percent to a fresh record high of $3,812.05 an ounce — eclipsing a peak reached last Tuesday — after notching six straight weekly gains. Silver increased as much as 2.4 percent, while platinum and palladium also rallied strongly, with gains underpinned by persistent market tightness and inflows into exchange-traded funds backed by the metals.

The dollar fell as investors awaited developments ahead of a planned meeting between top US congressional leaders and President Donald Trump on Monday — a day before federal funding would expire if an agreement on a short-term spending bill can’t be reached. A shutdown would threaten the release of key data including Friday’s payrolls report, which economists expect would show subdued jobs growth in September. A weaker greenback makes precious metals cheaper for most buyers.

Weaker employment figures would bolster the case for easing by Fed officials at their next rate decision in October — a scenario that would make non-interest bearing precious metals more attractive. Still, there’s a high degree of uncertainty over the outlook for the Fed’s cutting cycle, with officials voicing diverging views on monetary policy, while some economic data came in stronger than expected.

Traders also continued to weigh threats to the US central bank’s independence, after Fed Governor Lisa Cook’s attorneys on Thursday urged the Supreme Court to let her stay on the job while she fights Trump’s attempt to fire her.

Bullion doesn’t look overpriced relative to the dollar and Treasuries, which “ought to contain a level of Fed-related premium, given the nature of the risk” from the central bank’s potential loss of independence, Barclays Plc. strategists including Themistoklis Fiotakis and Lefteris Farmakis said in a note on Sunday. “This makes it a surprisingly good value hedge,” they added.

Gold has soared 45 percent this year, setting successive peaks on central-bank demand and a resumption of interest-rate cuts by the Fed. Prices are on track to close out a third consecutive quarterly gain next week, with holdings in bullion-backed ETFs at the highest since 2022. Banks including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Deutsche Bank AG have said they expect the rally to extend.

Meanwhile, gold’s precious metal peers have seen unprecedented tightness this year, exacerbating concerns about dwindling stockpiles of freely available metal in London as several years of supply deficits come to a head. Lease rates — which reflect the cost of borrowing metal, generally for a short period of time — for silver, platinum and palladium have all surged well above their normal levels of close to zero.

Fresh concerns that platinum-group metals may be swept up in Trump’s Section 232 investigation into critical minerals have exacerbated market tightness, according to Citigroup Inc. analysts led by Max Layton. The bank sees higher odds of palladium being subject to potential US import tariffs, pending the review that’s expected to land later in October, according to a note dated Sept. 19.

Spot gold was 1.2 percent higher to $3,806.69 an ounce as of 1:08 p.m. in Singapore. The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index edged down 0.2 percent.

Silver jumped to its highest since 2011 on Monday after rising above $45 an ounce last week for the first time in 14 years, and was trading up 1.5 percent to $46.7595 an ounce. Platinum was up 2.6 percent to trade above $1,600 an ounce for the first time since 2013, while palladium gained as much as 2.4 percent to its highest since July.