Live Gold Prices |
Price of Gold Per Ounce

What is a Live Gold Spot Price?

The spot price of gold is the current price that one unit of gold can be bought and sold for immediate delivery. In other words, the spot price of gold is the price of gold today. Like other financial assets such as stocks, bonds, currencies and commodities, the spot price of gold fluctuates throughout the week. Unlike a stock, which has a ticker symbol, the price of gold is often calculated from a futures contract price on the Commodities Exchange, or COMEX. A futures contract is a contract for delivery of gold at a future month. As a result, calculations are made to the futures price to determine the spot price or the price of gold today.

Live Gold Price in Ounces, Grams and Kilos

Depending on which country you are located in, the gold price is typically quoted in troy ounces, grams or kilos. Fortunately, it is easy to convert the gold price from one unit to another with the following conversion table.

In the United States, the gold price is typically quoted as a troy ounce. If the gold price were $1,800 USD per troy ounce and you wanted to convert the price to kilos, you would simply take the $1,800 price and multiply it by 32.150743 to get roughly $57,871 per kilo. Similarly, if you wanted to convert the price to grams, you would take the $1,800 and divide it by 31.103478 to get roughly $58 per gram.

Avoirdupois Ounce vs Troy Ounce

Not all ounces are the same. When people say "ounce" in their day to day lives, they are typically referring to the avoirdupois ounce, which is an Ancient Roman unit of measurement of approximately 28.3 grams. A troy ounce, on the other hand, is a unit of measurement used for precious metals dating back to the middle ages in Troyes, France. A troy ounce is heavier than an avoirdupois ounce and weighs approximately 31.1 grams. An investor should note that when the gold price, silver price or platinum price is quoted in "ounces", the "ounce" refers to the troy ounce and not the avoirdupois ounce. In addition, the most popular gold coins and gold bars, such as the Gold American Eagle, Gold Maple Leaf, Gold Kruggerand, Gold Pamp Suisse Bar, and Gold Credit Suisse Bar, are weighted in troy ounces and will state their weight in "ounce" or "oz".

Gold Spot Price in Different Currencies

Whether you're in North America, Europe, the Middle East, Asia, Australia or another part of the world, there will likely be demand for gold in your country. Gold will have the same "spot price" in different countries around the world. What will change is the currency that the spot price is quoted in.

Fortunately, if you have the spot price of gold in one currency, it is easy to calculate the spot price in another currency if you have an exchange rate. For example, let's say the gold price is $1,800 USD and the EUR/USD exchange rate is 1.17. To calculate the gold spot price in Euros, you would simply take the $1,800 USD price and divide it by 1.17 to arrive at €1,538.

Gold Price FAQs

What is Gold?

If you look up "gold" in a dictionary or encyclopedia, you will likely get something like gold is a chemical element with symbol Au and atomic number 79. Unfortunately, this is not very useful for an investor. For investors, gold is a commodity. Investors may choose to own commodities for a variety of reasons, including getting exposure to another asset class, diversification, or speculation.

What Makes Gold Valuable?

At just under $2,000 an ounce in 2021, gold by weight is one of the most expensive items money can buy. The most expensive caviar, Beluga caviar, typically sells for about $200 to $300 per ounce. A brand-new Rolls Royce, which starts at over $450,000, if valued based on its weight, would sell for about $5 per ounce. Why do investors value gold so highly? The reason is demand.

The US Dollar can be viewed as just a piece of paper or digits on a computer screen. Similarly, gold can be viewed as just a shiny piece of metal. The US Dollar has value because people around the world want it. Without this global demand, the US Dollar would have no value. Similarly, countries and societies around the world want gold as well. This demand is what drives the price of gold.

The demand for gold began at the dawn of civilization. Since gold must be extracted from the earth and cannot be manufactured at will, people used precious metals to store their wealth due to their limited supply. This practice has continued throughout history and still to today. With gold being traded on the global market with no single country controlling it, gold's purchasing power has remained stable in the face of inflation.

But I can't spend or eat my gold.

One of the common arguments against gold is "I can't spend my gold" or "I can't eat my gold." Just because you cannot spend your gold or eat your gold, does not mean it does not have value. If you were in the United States and had Euros, you would not be able to spend them. But your Euros are definitely not worthless. Your Euros can easily be converted into US Dollars, which can be spent anywhere in the United States. Similarly, gold can easily be converted into any major currency in the world to be spent.

What Determines the Gold Price?

There are dozens of factors that affect the gold price. Some factors include:

• Central Bank Demand: Gold is a key component of central bank reserves. In fact, central banks around the world cumulatively hold tens of thousands of metric tons of gold. A metric ton is equal to 1,000 kilos. More statistics on central bank gold ownership can be found through the World Gold Council.
• Investment Demand: Many bullion dealers, such as APMEX are seeing record demand for gold bullion. Between 2019 and 2020, demand for precious metals more than doubled. 2021 is on track to exceed demand seen in 2020.
• Mining Output: At one time, South Africa was the leader in gold mining output. However, the country continues to see declines in production. Although Russia and China have started opening new gold mines, they are not producing enough to make up the difference. While these mining companies aren't producing as much gold as they once did, demand for gold keeps growing. This imbalance in supply and demand is causing gold prices to climb steadily higher.
• Weak Currencies & Inflation: Typically, gold trades inversely to the strength of currencies. In recent years, governments have been printing currency at record rates, leading to a spike in the gold price.

Why do Investors Buy Gold?

Many investors believe that the current economic situation around the world will lead to an increase in the gold price. Some factors include:

• Quantitative easing: Governments around the world are printing and debasing their currencies at an increasing rate. As a currency is debased, typically gold will hold its purchasing power and appreciate in the debased currency.
• Debt and deficits: In 2020, the United States ran a deficit of $3.1 trillion, the largest deficit as a share of the economy since 1945. Other developed countries have similar trends.
• Negative real interest rates: Interest rates on financial instruments, such as the US 10-year Treasury note, are currently yielding less than the real inflation rate.
• Under-ownership: Historically, about 1.5% to 2.0% of financial assets are invested into precious metals. Currently, precious metals are under-owned, representing less than 1.0% of financial assets.

Is Gold a Good Investment in 2022?

Unfortunately, no one knows where the price of any asset will go in the short, medium and long term. It is possible that the gold price could increase. It is also possible that the gold price could decrease. However, this does not mean you should not buy gold.

Many seasoned investors believe in having an allocation to gold. In fact, using the last 50 years of data and looking at 10 year average returns, it is possible to have almost the return of a 100% stock portfolio with less volatility than a 100% bond portfolio by holding a mix of 80% in the S&P and 20% in gold.

How do I Start Investing in Gold?

There are many ways to buy gold, such as physical metals, mining stocks, futures contracts, exchange traded funds (ETFs) and vaulted / digital precious metals. We have outlined more about each way to buy gold and the pros and cons of each option in our 5 Ways to Buy Gold and Buy Silver article.

How often does the price of gold change?

Gold prices are constantly changing during market hours. The spot price of gold and the spot price of silver is determined by many domestic and foreign exchanges, which allows the spot prices to update from Sunday through Friday, 6 pm EST to 5:15 am EST. While gold, and other precious metals, may experience longer periods of relatively consistent prices, prices can also change rapidly within a moment's notice.

The price of gold can be a challenging thing to keep track of because it changes constantly based on current world market conditions, which affects both buying and selling, making it vital for investors to have up-to-date information about where their gold investment might go next. There are plenty of ways to get this data, such as checking market reports from experts to remain involved with the precious metals industry.

Is the U.S. Gold Price the same in every state?

No matter where you are, the gold spot price is the same at any moment. One OneGold, gold and silver your account may be denominated in U.S. Dollars, Canadian Dollars, Euros, or British Pounds, so the price per ounce of gold and price per ounce of silver is converted to the local currency to reflect one troy ounce of gold price.

Is Gold Taxed?

When buying vaulted gold, silver, or platinum through OneGold, you are not charged sales tax. However, if you redeem for physical precious metals you may be required to pay state and local sales tax on your purchase, but the tax rate you pay may vary depending on the address where we will be shipping your order.

How does OneGold determine Gold Spot Prices?

OneGold uses the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) Gold futures and adds an exchange for physical (EFP) when determining the current spot price. Many precious metals wholesalers and retailers use this process. The price of the gold futures contract is the price of gold for delivery at the end of a given month. The EFP adjusts the futures price to the price of gold for immediately delivery. Each day, OneGold works with several top wholesalers to get in alignment on the EFP.

We typically use the futures contract with the highest volume. Please follow this link on the CME for the most actively traded gold futures contracts.

What are bid and ask prices?

The ask of gold per ounce is the current minimum price for a dealer to sell in the market. Dealers will offer to sell gold to you for the asking price.

The asking price is different from the spot price. For example, if the spot price per ounce of silver is $30, the ask will be higher and include a premium that factors the cost of manufacturing.

The bid price of gold per ounce is the current highest market offer to sell to a dealer. Consumers can expect to receive the bid price when selling gold to a dealer.

What is OneGold?

OneGold is an online platform founded by APMEX and Sprott that allows users to buy, sell and own vaulted positions of physical precious metals. We offer gold, silver and platinum stored in various vaults around the world, including the US, Canada, Switzerland and the UK. If you want to take possession of your metal, you can redeem your positions for any of the 20,000+ products available at APMEX and your metal will be shipped the next business day.

OneGold offers the benefits of owning physical gold without any of the downsides. All positions are fully backed on an ounce for ounce basis. Metal is fully insured against theft and loss at secured facilities at Brinks, Loomis, The Royal Canadian Mint and APMEX. OneGold also offers the liquidity of an exchange traded fund (ETF) and pricing that is much more competitive than buying physical bullion bars and coins. If you want to dollar cost average into gold and silver like a corporate 401K plan, OneGold offers an AutoInvest feature where you can buy a set amount of gold and silver at regular intervals.