Gold price today falls as Warsh Fed chair pick lifts dollar, hits metals

Gold price today swung sharply lower on Friday, Jan. 30, 2026, as traders unwound a blistering January rally and repriced the outlook for U.S. interest rates after President Donald Trump nominated former Federal Reserve governor Kevin Warsh to succeed Jerome Powell when Powell’s chair term ends in May. The move hit the broader metals complex hard, with bullion, silver and related assets sliding together as the U.S. dollar strengthened and profit-taking accelerated.

The pullback is notable not just for its size, but for the speed: gold price today shifted from record-chasing momentum to forced deleveraging in less than 24 hours, following Thursday’s all-time high near $5,595 an ounce.

Gold price today: spot slides after Warsh nomination

Spot gold traded down roughly high-single digits on the session after the Warsh headline, briefly dipping below the psychologically important $5,000 level during the rout before stabilizing. The selloff followed an extraordinary run in gold prices through January that left positioning stretched and made the market vulnerable to a catalyst that could lift the dollar and real yields.

Even after Friday’s drop, bullion remains up strongly for the month, keeping January on track as one of gold’s best monthly performances in decades—an important context for why the reversal has been so abrupt.

Gold spot price and gold futures snapshot

Here is a numbers-first view of the gold spot price and gold futures, plus an indicative “gold rate today” conversion, all in U.S. dollars.

The gap between spot and the front-month gold futures reflects fast-changing liquidity and hedging flows during a high-volatility session, along with normal basis dynamics that can widen when markets get disorderly.

GLD stock tracks the drop in bullion

GLD stock—SPDR Gold Shares, a widely used ETF proxy for bullion—moved in the same direction as the underlying metal, sliding close to 10% on the day as investors reduced exposure across precious-metals trades.

By early afternoon, GLD was around $447 per share, with an intraday range roughly between $446 and $473. For equity investors using GLD as their “gold prices” dashboard, Friday’s action read as a broad reset rather than a single headline blip.

Why gold prices reversed so violently

Friday’s decline is best understood as three forces hitting at once:

1. Dollar strength and rate expectations. A new Fed chair nominee can shift assumptions about future policy, even before any vote. A firmer dollar tends to pressure gold because it raises the metal’s effective cost for many non-U.S. buyers.

2. Positioning after a parabolic rally. January’s surge pulled in momentum strategies and leverage. When the market turns, stop-losses, margin calls, and systematic risk controls can push selling into a cascade.

3. Complex-wide deleveraging. Gold didn’t fall alone. Silver and other precious metals sold off sharply, pointing to broad “metals complex” liquidation rather than a gold-only fundamental change.

The net result: a classic air-pocket drop, where liquidity thins just as selling intensifies, widening intraday ranges and making price discovery messy.

What to watch next

The near-term question is whether bullion can rebuild a base after this shakeout. Traders are focused on whether spot can hold the $5,000 neighborhood in coming sessions, and on how quickly volatility cools enough for physical demand to re-engage at lower levels.

On the macro side, markets will parse every new detail around Warsh’s confirmation path and any signals about the Fed’s priorities on inflation, growth, and balance sheet policy. If the dollar continues to firm and real yields drift higher, gold may stay under pressure; if the selloff exhausts forced selling and safe-haven demand remains steady, the metal could stabilize and trade more two-sided into February.

Sources consulted: Reuters; CME Group; Investing.com; Federal Reserve; Nasdaq.