Boockvar: Gold's Drop Below $4,000 Was Forced Selling, Not a Collapse

Peter Boockvar, chief investment officer at OnePoint BFG Wealth Partners, said gold's more than $120 an ounce drop on October 30 and its break below $4,000 was not a collapse in the investment thesis but forced selling. Speaking to Kitco News on the sidelines of the New Orleans Investment Conference, he explained that the metal was not trading on its fundamentals, and there may have been a seller forced by margin or other reasons.

Boockvar said gold had moved in recent weeks in unusually close tandem with the S&P 500, as if part of the tech trade, adding: "They treat gold like an AI stock, but it isn't." He saw the drop as not based on fundamentals, possibly near the end of this wave, and the opportunity as good for anyone with a time horizon beyond a week.

Gold later rose about $112, or 2.9%, to around $4,041 an ounce by mid-morning on November 4, as the dollar and bond yields fell after the midterm elections, while Bloomberg described the increase as the largest since August. Boockvar said he had been waiting for third-quarter central bank buying data, and it came in stronger than he expected.

World Gold Council data on November 3 showed central banks bought a net 321 tonnes in the third quarter, the fastest pace since 2024, while gold ETF holdings rose 211 tonnes to a record. Boockvar saw real yields starting to decline and the dollar looking fragile, but warned that investment in tech stocks has become dangerously concentrated, urging investors not to wait for the Fed to rescue that trade.

What do these terms mean?

Forced selling: Selling securities or commodities because of margin or liquidity pressure, not because the seller's conviction changed.

Exchange-traded fund (ETF): A fund that trades on an exchange like a stock and tracks an asset such as gold instead of holding the metal itself.

Real yield: A bond's return after subtracting inflation, and one of the most important drivers of gold's appeal.

Margin: The amount a trader deposits to secure an open position, and may be asked to add when the price moves against them.