Why is gold dropping: gold and silver fall at the end of October 2026, silver to an 11-month low

Gold and silver prices on 29 and 30 October 2026

Why is gold dropping at the end of October 2026? Kitco’s evening report of 29 October put spot gold near $4,024.60 an ounce, down $42.00 or 1.03 percent, and spot silver near $52.18, down 3.10 percent. Kitco’s morning report of 30 October, written in early U.S. trading, had spot gold near $3,958.80, down $61.34 or 1.32 percent, and spot silver near $50.08, down $2.12. In that report gold had slipped under $4,000 and was heading for a second monthly decline in a row.

Silver’s level has a second source. Yahoo Finance reported on 30 October that December silver futures opened at $52.25 an ounce and had slid to $50.55 by 7:15 a.m. Eastern time, which it called the lowest level since 26 November 2025. The article blames what it calls ongoing inflation concerns and gives no inflation figures.

How far gold and silver are from their January 2026 highs

Both metals set records in the last days of January 2026, and both now trade far below them. The price-history site Metalcharts lists an intraday spot peak of about $5,590 an ounce for gold on 28 January 2026 and $121.62 for silver on 29 January, and it warns that intraday peaks differ slightly between spot, futures and benchmark feeds. An IANS report on the DSP Netra July 2026 edition, published by Orissa Post, gives $5,602 for gold and $121.6 for silver, both in January.

Set against Kitco’s quote of 30 October, simple arithmetic gives a fall of about 29 percent for gold and about 59 percent for silver from those peaks. This is an editorial calculation that mixes an intraday peak with a morning quote, so it is an order of magnitude and not an exact statistic. The same IANS report named lows reached during the correction, $3,942 for gold and $55.6 for silver.

The Federal Reserve, inflation data and yields behind the drop

Much of what the market reports say about why gold is dropping runs through U.S. interest rates. On 28 October the Federal Reserve’s own statement said the Committee kept the target range for the federal funds rate at 3-3/4 to 4 percent. The vote was 10 to 2, and the two dissenters, Lisa D. Cook and Beth M. Hammack, preferred a quarter-point increase. Kitco reported that futures priced about an 83 percent probability of a quarter-point increase at the meeting of 8 and 9 December.

Data published on 29 October gave that pricing support, according to Kitco. The advance estimate of third-quarter growth was 3.4 percent at an annual rate, against 2.2 percent in the second quarter. The September PCE price index rose 0.5 percent on the month and 3.6 percent on the year, up from 3.4 percent in August, while the core measure stood at 3.1 percent on the year, up from 3.0 percent. Metals Focus, whose report Kitco summarised on 29 October, says higher rates raise the opportunity cost of holding metals that pay no interest.

One detail complicates the simple story. Kitco’s report of 30 October says the ten-year yield fell 7 basis points on Thursday and that gold lost ground anyway, pointing to expectations of tighter policy and a broader liquidation of precious metals. Market reports of this kind list the factors traders were discussing, and they do not measure how much each one contributed on a given day.

Oil, the Strait of Hormuz and the inflation worry

Energy prices are the second thread in the coverage. Kitco’s evening report of 29 October gives settlement prices of $114.88 a barrel for Brent and $102.00 for WTI. On 30 October the same outlet reported that a tanker in the Strait of Hormuz was struck by explosive devices attached to its hull by a small boat, that responsibility had not been established, and that December Brent was climbing toward $117.15 while WTI was near $103.79.

Metals Focus, in the report Kitco summarised on 29 October, writes that the war in Iran is pushing energy prices higher and feeding inflation concerns. Yahoo Finance adds a separate line on 30 October: oil prices were rising on expectations of renewed U.S. attacks on Iranian targets, and President Trump has signalled that the United States may resume attacks after the midterm elections next week.

Why silver is falling faster than gold

In percentage terms silver fell roughly three times as far as gold on both days, by Kitco’s figures: 3.10 against 1.03 percent on 29 October, and about 4 against 1.32 percent on 30 October. Metals Focus says the gold-to-silver ratio rose above 76 for the first time since December 2025, after a range of 60 to 70 through much of the summer, and that it is up more than 11 percent this year. Kitco’s report of 30 October links silver’s larger losses to worries about industrial demand, energy costs, restrictive borrowing conditions and a break below technical support.

Metals Focus explains the difference by the structure of the two markets. As Kitco summarises it, gold is better insulated because of its monetary role and safe-haven demand, together with central bank buying and long-term investors, while silver is more exposed to industrial demand and speculative flows. The firm’s own outlook, dated 29 October, is that silver could see further losses against gold, that silver should keep following gold over the next 12 months, and that the underperformance should not last indefinitely. That is a forecast by one firm and not a finding of this story, and past moves do not predict future ones.

Physical demand, fund holdings and central bank buying

Metals Focus, again through Kitco on 29 October, describes a physical silver market that has loosened. London vault inventories reached 932 million ounces by the end of September, the highest in nearly four years. Sales of primary silver bullion coins fell by more than 80 percent in the second quarter against the first, to the lowest quarterly level since the survey began in 2010, and the third quarter recovered modestly but stayed 22 percent below a year earlier.

For gold, the World Gold Council’s Gold Demand Trends report for the second quarter, published on 30 July 2026, gives the central bank figures. It counts net purchases of 289 tonnes in the second quarter and 345 tonnes in the first half, which it calls the lowest first half since 2022. These figures end in June, so they say nothing about what central banks did in October.

What the move looks like in roubles: the Bank of Russia’s official price

For readers who think in roubles, the Bank of Russia publishes its own official prices for precious metals, set for each date. Its page lists gold at 10,484.12 roubles a gram and silver at 139.47 for 30 October 2026. For 29 October the figures are 10,548.50 and 138.50, and for 28 October 10,417.84 and 139.94. Compared with 23 October, the gold price for 30 October is lower by about 2.6 percent and silver by about 7.1 percent, by simple division.

The Bank of Russia also sets official exchange rates: for 30 October 2026 they are 80.6761 roubles per US dollar and 89.8167 roubles per euro. Dividing the gold price by those rates gives about 130 dollars or about 116.7 euros per gram. That is arithmetic on official figures and not a market quote, and the Bank of Russia series is separate from the dollar quotes in the sections above, so the two should not be compared minute by minute.

Dates to follow after 30 October: jobs, prices and the December Fed meeting

The next scheduled events are on official calendars. The Bureau of Labor Statistics lists the October 2026 Employment Situation report for Friday 6 November at 8:30 a.m. Eastern time and the October Consumer Price Index for Tuesday 10 November at the same hour. The Federal Reserve’s calendar lists the next Federal Open Market Committee meeting for 8 and 9 December 2026, one of the meetings accompanied by a Summary of Economic Projections, and a first 2027 meeting on 26 and 27 January, which it marks as tentative.

Everything about the direction of prices after today is a forecast, and this story offers none of its own. The forecasts quoted here come with their author and date: Metals Focus on 29 October for silver against gold, and futures pricing of about 83 percent for a December increase, reported by Kitco on 30 October. Official sources update on their own schedule: federalreserve.gov for statements, bls.gov for data and cbr.ru for the daily metal prices in roubles. This is a news summary and not investment advice, and it does not tell anyone what to do with gold or silver.