The United States and Iran traded their heaviest blows since July this week. American aircraft bombed Iranian installations along the Strait of Hormuz, Iran fired missiles and drones at US bases in Jordan, Bahrain, Iraq and Kuwait, and Brent crude jumped to 97.20 dollars a barrel. On news like that you expect a gold price that shoots higher. The surge never came. Gold trades at 4,432.87 dollars per troy ounce on Thursday morning, roughly one percent up on the day, with silver at 65.83 dollars. A tidy gain, not a stampede. For anyone planning to sell old gold or silver, understanding that gap matters at least as much as the price itself.
What happened this week around the Strait of Hormuz
It began with a run of incidents in the strait itself. In late August a tanker was struck by three projectiles and Washington accused Iran of laying sea mines again. American strikes followed on Revolutionary Guard installations, among them on the island of Larak. Iran retaliated on Wednesday with missiles and drones aimed at US bases in four countries, with Kuwait, Jordan and Bahrain intercepting part of the incoming fire. Since the truce expired in mid August without an agreement, this was the first large exchange of fire.
President Trump confirmed the scale of the operation on Wednesday while making clear the campaign would not run on for long.
We hit them very hard last night. We're prepared to do another one any time we want.
It is that second sentence that explains much of the calm across the metals markets. Investors read it as a short, bounded operation rather than the start of a wider regional war. Shipping remains badly disrupted, though: six merchant vessels crossed the strait on Wednesday, against eleven the day before and more than twenty a week ago.
Why a war does not automatically lift the gold price
Gold has a reputation as a safe haven, but that mechanism is not the only force acting on the price. A conflict around the world’s most important oil route works through a second channel that pulls the other way. Costlier oil pushes inflation expectations up. Higher inflation expectations push rate expectations up. And because gold itself pays no interest, it loses appeal the moment government bonds pay more.
That second channel has been in charge for weeks. The market currently puts the odds of an American rate rise on 16 September at roughly 64 percent, and the yield on ten year US government paper is hovering around 4.79 percent. That is a stiff headwind. We saw the same pattern in late July, when rates beat war risk and silver shed more than 3 percent in a single day even as oil traded above 100 dollars.
Where today’s gold price comes from
This week’s gain, then, did not come from the war. It came from the American labour market. The employment report from payroll processor ADP showed 38,000 new private sector jobs in August on Wednesday, against roughly 48,000 expected. That is the weakest month since January. A softer labour market makes a rate rise less likely, bond yields eased slightly and gold rebounded. Kitco closed Wednesday at 4,386.70 dollars, up more than 1.3 percent, and Thursday added another percent on top.
Put that level in perspective. Gold today sits clearly below the peak of 25 August, around 4,696 dollars, and much further below the record of late January 2026, when the price reached 5,589.38 dollars. How that daily price is set and how it converts into euros is explained on our page about the gold price.
What this means if you want to sell old gold
The practical lesson of this week is that a war headline does not translate into an expectation about your own settlement. The price barely reacted to missiles and reacted strongly to a jobs figure. Anyone planning a sale around the loudest news is planning around the wrong news.
For your own items, three things weigh more heavily than the headlines. The actual purity determines most of the proceeds: an 18 carat chain contains 75 percent gold, a 9 carat one barely 37.5 percent. The exchange rate counts, because the world market quotes in dollars while you are paid in euros. And the price on the day itself is the only figure that says anything about that day’s settlement. How that conversion works step by step is set out on the page about selling old gold.
Gold rose this week despite the war, not because of it. The real engine remains the American rate outlook. So always ask for the price on the day itself, and have your items weighed and tested first.
With silver, all of this is sharper still. The market is smaller and more than half of the metal is consumed by industry, which makes the price swing harder. Anyone with silver cutlery or old jewellery at home will therefore notice a bigger difference from one day to the next. What counts during weighing, and which pieces are solid, is explained on the page about selling silver.
Friday brings the official American jobs report for August, and the central bank meets on rates in the middle of the month. Both can move the price sharply again. We post the latest standing on the site every working day.