People love simple explanations for gold prices. If inflation rises, gold should rise. If the economy weakens, gold should rise. If governments print too much money, gold should rise. Sometimes it works that way. Sometimes it doesn’t. That frustrates newer bullion buyers because they expect gold to move in a straight line whenever financial conditions look unstable. But markets rarely behave that neatly. Gold trades inside a global financial system driven by liquidity, sentiment, leverage, central banks, interest rates, currency markets, institutional positioning, and plain old human emotion. Supply and demand sit ... (full story)