This is precisely what happened when gold prices breached the historical barrier of ,200 per ounce. However, this fact that central banks tend to be sellers of gold during rallies in the gold market doesn’t mean that gold prices cannot rally for a significant period of time. What this means is that the days of straight up advances in gold prices though likely aren’t as likely as they once were. Bottom line gold is a tricky market.

Gold prices are heavily influenced by political crisis and political upheavals. In times of political crisis, gold prices tend to rally higher. South Africa is the world’s largest gold exporter. It accounts for more than 25% of the gold exports in the world market. South Africa is followed by Russia, United States, Canada, Australia and Brazil. Remember the California gold rush of 19th century. Many people went, many kept on digging and only a few found gold. Now the days of gold rushes are over. Almost all the gold mines have been discovered.

The second is the influence of inflation. In times of high inflation, wealthy investors tend to flee to the gold as a safe haven asset. However, this influence has been reduced due to the management of gold prices by the central banks. Now gold prices and USD tend to move in opposite direction. This negative correlation isn’t perfect but tends to hold over longer periods of time.

There are many exchanges in the world where gold gets traded. The most popular is the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX). The second most popular is the Chicago Board Of Trade (CBOT). GOld futures on CBOT have relatively low margin requirements. This makes trading gold futures highly attractive for retail traders. The international benchmark for gold is the London Price Fix. London Price Fix is quoted in troy ouncestwice daily known as A.M Fix and the P.M Fix and is set in US Dollar.

Now, good news is that mini gold futures contracts also get traded on CBOT. These mini gold futures contracts hold 33.2 troy ounces per contract as compared to 100 troy ounces per contract. Mini gold futures contracts have lower margin requirements as compared to the regular contracts. Now this is the best time to trade gold futures. You can combine gold trading with currency trading. Both hedge each other and can be highly lucrative.

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