Hold onto your hats, the gold price has just smashed new record high prices.
Again.
Earlier today, the yellow metal was trading for US$3,865.14 (AU$5,847) per ounce, marking yet another new all-time high. That saw the gold price up a jaw-dropping 46.7% since this time last year, in US dollar terms.
As we head into the Wednesday lunch hour, gold is still hovering near that new record, trading for US$3,862.40 per ounce.
The yellow metal has found support from a number of factors.
That includes ongoing robust central bank buying, along with falling interest rates in most major economies. Gold, which pays no yield itself, tends to perform better in low and falling interest rate environments.
Bullion has also benefited from its classic haven status, with both institutional and retail demand growing amid the turbulent geopolitical times. That's also led to outsized inflows into gold tracking exchange traded funds (ETFs).
And it looks like the latest push sending the gold price to yet another new record high comes from the shutdown of the United States government following the Federal budget impasse between Republican and Democrats in the US Senate. A weaker US dollar is also providing the yellow metal a lift.
Image source: Getty Images
Can the gold price keep racing higher?
With such an epic run higher, is gold due for a retrace. Or can bullion keep charging higher into 2026?
Argonaut's executive chairman and co-founder, Eddie Rigg, is among the experts tipping significant further upside (courtesy of The Australian Financial Review).
On Monday Argonaut lifted its forecast for gold by US$500 per ounce to US$4,500 per ounce. That's more than 16% above the current gold price.
And Rigg expects the record high price, and resulting surging profits for S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) gold stocks, will see more mergers and acquisitions in the coming months.
According to Rigg:
Not many of the developers will get to develop their assets because the gold mining companies have so much free cash that they will go and buy these developers in a heartbeat. Companies like Minerals 260 Ltd (ASX: MI6) and Ballard Mining Ltd (ASX:BM1). They are absolute targets.
Victor Smorgon portfolio manager Cameron Judd also believes the bull run for gold has further to run.
"Global tailwinds continue to elevate gold's strategic role in global portfolios underpinned by widening fiscal imbalances [and] rising geopolitical tensions," Judd said (quoted by the AFR).
"Both fundamentals and the broader macro environment [are] providing strong tailwinds into 2026," Collins St Asset Management chief investment officer Vasilios Piperoglou added.
How are ASX 200 gold shares performing?
As you'd expect, ASX 200 gold shares have broadly been rocketing higher alongside the surging gold price.
Over the past 12 months, for example, the S&P/ASX All Ordinaries Gold Index (ASX: XGD) is up a whopping 88.8%.
Here's how some of the top ASX 200 gold stocks have performed over that same period:
- Northern Star Resources Ltd (ASX: NST) shares are up 50.9%
- Newmont Corp (ASX: NEM) shares are up 67.5%
- Ramelius Resources Ltd (ASX: RMS) shares are up 78.4%
- Evolution Mining Ltd (ASX: EVN) shares are up 139.5%
- Bellevue Gold Ltd (ASX: BGL) shares are down 12.6%
- Perseus Mining Ltd (ASX: PRU) shares are up 90.5%
- West African Resources Ltd (ASX: WAF) are up 75.7%
- Vault Minerals Ltd (ASX: VAU) shares are up 95.6%
- Genesis Minerals Ltd (ASX: GMD) shares are up 201.7%
- Westgold Resources Ltd (ASX: WGX) shares are up 93.0%
And this stellar performance doesn't even include the dividends many of the ASX 200 gold stocks paid out over the full year, as the soaring gold price has boosted cash flows and profits.
Boom!
