Gold Price Forecast: CPI, Hormuz Toll, and the 4,000 Line

By Ken Chigbo · Founder, KenMacro · 18+ years in markets, London trading floor and institutional FX
Updated 2026-07-14 08:05 BST

Find Ken on X @realkenchigbo · YouTube @Realkenchigbo · MACRO MASTERY Discord

Gold is up half a percent this morning, and that is the tell. Missiles are flying, the US is blockading Hormuz, the war is widening into Saudi Arabia and Yemen, and the haven metal spent Monday falling. This is a rates market, not a fear market, and today’s CPI decides whether the bounce off the 4,000 handle has any legs.

Jump to:The Macro Setup · Multi-Timeframe Read · Scenario Map · What Invalidates the Read · Final Takeaway · FAQ

The Macro Setup Behind Today’s Gold Price Forecast

The oil shock has been taxed. Trump has notified Congress of a new war against Iran, CENTCOM reinstates the naval blockade on Iranian vessels today at 16:00 EDT, and Trump is levying a 20% toll on all cargo transiting the Strait of Hormuz, which carries about 20% of the world’s traded oil and gas. Brent is at 84.72 after rising 9.6% the previous session, roughly +11% in two days. WTI sits at 79.57. The war is widening: Saudi airstrikes hit Sanaa International Airport on Monday and the Houthis retaliated with missiles and drones on Saudi Arabia’s Abha International Airport, with no casualties reported (AP, Al Jazeera, Haaretz).

Here is the distinction the tape is drawing, and it is the whole reason gold is where it is. A fear spike mean-reverts when the fear fades. A toll is a cost, and costs get passed through. The US 10-year yield is at 4.61%, up from 4.54% on Friday. On CME FedWatch a July 29 hike is now priced at about 43% (43.3% hike against 56.7% no change, 0.0% cut, contract ZQN6); CNBC has quoted it as high as 46.5% intraday, and Kalshi has it at 36%, up from under 20% on Sunday and under 10% earlier this month. In two weeks a July hike has gone from a non-event to roughly a coin flip. Fed funds are 3.50 to 3.75%; a hike takes them to 3.75 to 4.00%.

That is why the haven metal has been falling. Missiles fly and gold sells off because rising real yields raise the opportunity cost of holding a metal that pays you nothing. In every rate-repricing episode of this cycle gold has sold off whenever real yields pushed to new highs, even with geopolitical risk elevated, and a haven metal losing 4,050 in the same week the US blockades Hormuz is that template repeating almost exactly. The MACRO MASTERY desk called this rotation on Sunday night, before the FedWatch move began, and the read has held.

Today is CPI day. June CPI lands at 13:30 BST. Consensus is a headline of minus 0.1% m/m, cutting the annual rate from 4.2% to about 3.9%, the first decline in four months. Core is expected at +0.2% m/m, with the annual core steady at 2.9%. Chair Kevin Warsh then testifies to the House Financial Services Committee at 15:00 BST, ninety minutes after the print, on his debut semiannual testimony. He cannot dodge the number.

Here is the edge, and it must land. Everyone will trade the headline, and the headline is the trap. Today’s print is structurally blind. The expected negative headline is mechanically an energy base effect because US pump prices fell about 10% in June, the fourth-largest monthly drop in a decade. June CPI measures June. It cannot see the blockade, it cannot see the 20% toll, and it cannot see an 11% two-day move in Brent, because none of it had happened when the data was collected. The oil shock that matters lands in the July and August prints. Read core, at +0.2% and 2.9% annual, and sticky. That is the number Waller told you he is watching.

Governor Christopher Waller has published the trigger. In his 13 July speech he said that if there is another hot reading on core inflation, the FOMC “will need to consider tightening monetary policy in the near term”, and that he will not repeat “the mistake we made in 2021 by not responding sooner”. His direct line: “Sternly staring at inflation until it melts before our withering gaze is not an option.” Balance him honestly: he warned against “fighting the last war”, noted the labour market is far less tight than 2021 and market-based inflation expectations are anchored near 2%, and wants more data. But the reaction function is now public, and it is not the headline. It is core.

Cross-asset, the tape is coherent. DXY sits at 101.20 (-0.03%), holding the ground it took on Monday’s surge; the 101.02 cap it reclaimed has now flipped to support. EURUSD trades at 1.1390 near a one-year low with the 1.1400 base broken. GBPUSD is at 1.3359, sitting exactly on the 1.3357 support. The dollar’s path of least resistance is up while crude is bid and hike risk is being dragged forward. Core, then Warsh’s tone ninety minutes later, decide whether it extends or stalls. For context on how the dollar moves gold, the mechanism is exactly what is playing out this week.

Multi-Timeframe Read: What the Gold Price Forecast Structure Says

On the daily, the structure broke Monday. Gold lost 4,050, the shelf that had held into last week, and closed under it. That flips 4,050 from support to the first cap on the way back up. The 20-day average at 4,149 is the cap above that. Below current price, the 4,000 handle is doing exactly what a round number does: it is holding as the psychological line where the bigger structure is decided, and the tape is basing on it rather than punching straight through. That is behaviour that either resolves into a base or into a shelf that gives way on a second test.

The H4 tape frames the fight cleanly. Monday’s slide printed a decisive lower low under 4,050, and overnight into London the buyers have been defending 4,000 without conviction on the reclaim. Gold at 4,023.74 (+0.55%) is inside the value area of Monday’s break, not above it. Until 4,050 is reclaimed on a closing basis with real volume through it, the H4 read is a broken structure being retested from beneath, not a base under construction.

Intraday, the tape is thin and the desk expects it to stay thin until 13:30 BST. Bids stepped in twice at the 4,000 round overnight; that is the defended intraday low to watch. Sellers have twice failed above 4,035. That is the range the CPI print will resolve, and the resolution is directional either way. The MACRO MASTERY desk covers CPI live as the print lands, with the tape reaction annotated in real time.

Scenario Map

Bull scenario (softer core). If core prints at consensus or below, the July hike odds come off the boil, the 10-year fades from 4.61%, and the dollar’s engine dims. In that path, gold tends to lift off the 4,000 base and press toward 4,050, the lost support that is now the cap. A closing reclaim of 4,050 opens 4,100, the pivot round, as the next liquidity above. The catch, and it must not be forgotten, is that the soft headline is an energy base effect and Warsh testifies ninety minutes later; if his tone is hawkish, the bounce stalls before 4,100.

Bear scenario (hot core, or hawkish Warsh). If core prints at +0.3% m/m or the annual core lifts, Waller’s trigger is armed, July hike odds punch through 50%, yields extend, and the dollar takes another leg. In that path, gold tends to lose the 4,000 handle on the second or third test, opens 3,960 as the deeper support, and puts the 3,940 June low into play as the floor. The gold price forecast in this scenario is not about how far it falls, it is about whether 3,940 holds or breaks; the whole June range depends on it.

The Cross-Asset Frame Around the Gold Price Forecast

The tape this morning is coherent and it is telling one story. DXY is holding Monday’s gains at 101.20, not fading them; the euro has broken the 1.1400 range base and opened near a one-year low; cable sits pinned to the 1.3357 support; Brent and WTI are on a second day of gains. The dollar is firm because yields are up, and yields are up because the market is pricing an oil-led inflation impulse. Gold has been the drag inside that regime because it is priced against real yields, not against fear.

What matters for the next twelve hours is not the geopolitics headline that hits at 21:00 BST when CENTCOM’s blockade goes live. It is the 13:30 BST print and the 15:00 BST testimony. If you want the guided walk through the print as it lands, the MACRO MASTERY desk runs CPI live with tape annotation. For the standing playbook on the print itself, our guide on how to trade CPI lays out the read.

Final Takeaway

Gold is basing at 4,000 inside a broken structure, and the direction from here is decided by core CPI at 13:30 BST, not by the missiles flying overnight. A soft headline gives the metal room to bounce toward 4,050 and 4,100 but does not repair the structure; a hot core lifts yields and presses the 4,000 handle until it gives way to 3,960 and the 3,940 June low. Yields are leading gold, and the only thing that breaks that link is a genuine supply rupture at Hormuz.

“Missiles are flying, Hormuz is blockaded, and gold is down. That is not a broken haven. That is a rates market. Read the dollar first and gold second.”

Gold Price Forecast FAQ

Why is gold falling while the US blockades the Strait of Hormuz?

Because this is being priced as an inflation shock, not a fear shock. The US 10-year yield sits at 4.61%, a July hike is roughly 43% priced on CME FedWatch, and rising real yields raise the opportunity cost of holding a metal that pays nothing. Missiles and blockades usually bid gold, but when the same catalyst lifts yields harder than it lifts fear, the yield channel wins. A supply rupture at Hormuz would flip that calculus.

What is the key level for gold today?

The 4,000 handle. Gold at 4,023.74 is basing on it after losing 4,050 on Monday. If 4,000 holds through CPI and Warsh testimony, the metal has room to reclaim 4,050 and press 4,100. If 4,000 gives way on a second or third test, 3,960 opens and the 3,940 June low becomes the next reference. Watch it at 13:30 BST and again at 15:00 BST.

Why is today’s CPI print described as structurally blind?

Because June CPI measures June. The Hormuz blockade, the 20% toll on cargo, and the 11% two-day move in Brent all happened after the June data was collected. The consensus headline of minus 0.1% m/m is mechanically an energy base effect from US pump prices falling about 10% in June, the fourth-largest monthly drop in a decade. The oil shock lands in the July and August prints, not this one.

What is Waller’s trigger and why does it matter?

In his 13 July speech Governor Christopher Waller said that if there is another hot reading on core inflation, the FOMC “will need to consider tightening monetary policy in the near term”. He referenced the 2021 mistake of not responding sooner and said, “Sternly staring at inflation until it melts before our withering gaze is not an option.” The trigger is core CPI, expected at +0.2% m/m with annual core steady at 2.9%. A hotter print arms the July 29 hike.

How does the US dollar move gold in this regime?

Through real yields. When the dollar is firm because US yields are rising, real yields rise with them, and gold is priced against real yields. DXY at 101.20 is holding Monday’s surge and the 10-year is at 4.61%. That is the drag on gold. Once the dollar stops going up and yields fade, the drag lifts and gold tends to reclaim broken shelves. The full mechanism is walked through here.

Who is Kevin Warsh and why does his testimony matter today?

Kevin Warsh is the Fed Chair, testifying to the House Financial Services Committee at 15:00 BST on his debut semiannual testimony, ninety minutes after the June CPI print lands. He cannot dodge the number. His tone on whether core inflation warrants a July hike is the second half of today’s catalyst window. A hawkish tone extends the yield trade; a dovish push-back on Waller cracks it.

Is the 4,000 handle in gold a buying opportunity?

The desk does not publish trade ideas in public analysis, only structure. What can be said is that 4,000 is the psychological line where the bigger structure is decided, and gold is basing on it rather than breaking through. Whether it holds depends on core CPI at 13:30 BST and Warsh testimony at 15:00 BST. A hot core arms the July hike and presses 4,000; a soft headline gives room toward 4,050.

Educational analysis only. Past performance does not guarantee future results. Manage risk against your own portfolio.