Gold sinks 3.5% to a one-year low as the tech rout spreads

Gold dropped to its lowest level in a year Friday as the selloff that began in technology stocks spread into precious metals. Reuters reported spot gold at $3,880.97 an ounce at 2:13 p.m. ET, down 3.5%, while December U.S. gold futures settled 3.3% lower at $3,898.90.

Silver fell even harder. Reuters put spot silver at $49, down 6.5%, its first move below $50 in 11 months. The drop was not a normal flight toward safety: Treasuries rallied during the stock retreat, yet gold and silver fell alongside risk assets.

The failed safe-haven test

The session matters because it separates two ideas that are often treated as the same trade. Investors can seek safety in government bonds while simultaneously raising cash by reducing positions elsewhere. Gold is liquid, so it can be sold during a margin call or a broad portfolio reduction even when the news backdrop would ordinarily support it.

Commerzbank analysts told Reuters that Friday's technology decline may have caused forced sales of safe-haven assets and margin calls. That is an explanation, not proof of the identity or motive of every seller. The observable fact is the cross-asset pattern: Reuters' market wrap reported that the Nasdaq 100 fell 3.5% and Treasuries rallied, while gold still lost 3.5%.

A late U.S. trading report from Kitco showed the pressure continuing, with spot gold near $3,879.90 and spot silver near $49.015. Kitco also described liquidation pressure as outweighing the support that precious metals normally receive from falling yields and geopolitical uncertainty.

The number behind the one-year low

The Chronicle's chart uses the continuous COMEX gold futures series from Yahoo Finance. Yahoo metadata timestamped its $3,884.90 final traded price at 4:59:59 p.m. ET. That Oct. 30 daily-bar close was down 27.0% from the series peak on Jan. 29 and down 3.3% from the observation one year earlier. It is distinct from the official $3,898.90 settlement; the endpoint was retrieved at 5:51 p.m., after Friday trading ended.

Why silver's fall was larger

Gold has a central-bank and safe-haven demand base that the other precious metals do not share to the same degree. Reuters noted that silver is increasingly treated as an industrial-growth metal. Friday's selloff pushed the gold-to-silver ratio to 79 ounces of silver for one ounce of gold, the widest gap in 11 months, compared with 46 in January.

For traders, the next useful signal is not simply whether gold rebounds. It is whether the metal can regain its usual divergence from falling equities. Another session in which bonds rise while gold and silver fall would keep liquidation, rather than classic haven demand, at the center of the metals story.

Sources: Reuters metals report, Reuters market wrap, Kitco, and the Yahoo Finance chart endpoint, accessed Oct. 30, 2026. This is market information, not investment advice.