Ed Yardeni says gold could fall to $4,000 before its rally resumes
Gold prices shot to the moon last year, climbing over 70%.
However, for much of 2026, the ride has been anything but smooth, with conditions deteriorating after the Iran war.
Gold prices retreated nearly 1% on Monday to $4,321.80 an ounce after sliding 3% on Friday in its worst one-day percentage drop since March 26.
The latest pullback comes at a relatively strange time for gold bulls.
For perspective, the U.S. economy looks mostly resilient (at least on paper), the May jobs report came in stronger than expected, and Treasury yields moved higher.
To back up those claims, the 2-year Treasury yield came in around 4.15% on Monday after hitting 4.17% on Friday, the highest level in nearly 15 months, according to Reuters.
Higher Treasury yields make gold less attractive since the metal does not pay interest.
Despite the bearishness, though, not everyone's ready to walk away from the trade.
According to TheFly, veteran market strategist Ed Yardeni, founder of Yardeni Research, believes gold may have another key level to test before the rally resumes.
He sees the recent weakness as an opportunity to buy, arguing that gold's rally could restart once geopolitical tensions subside.
How gold has performed
- Gold is down 8.02% over the past month.
- Gold is up 3.40% over the past six months.
- Gold is up 30.61% over the past year.
- Gold is up 128.63% over the past five years.
- Gold is up 614.52% over the past twenty years.
Source: Goldprice.org.
Who is Ed Yardeni?
Yardeni is a veteran Wall Street voice, bringing decades of experience spanning Wall Street, Washington, and academia.
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He founded Yardeni Research in 2007, after holding senior strategy roles at Oak Associates, Prudential Equity Group, and Deutsche Bank's US stocks division.
Before that, he honed his skills in macroeconomics, working at firms such as CJ Lawrence, Prudential-Bache Securities, and EF Hutton.
One of his biggest contributions is the "Fed model", a popular valuation tool that pits the stock market's forward earnings yield with the yield on long-term government bonds.
Though the tool attracts its fair share of critics, it remains Yardeni's signature contribution to market analysis.
Apart from Wall Street, he has taught at Columbia University's Graduate School of Business and worked at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the U.S. Treasury Department.
Also, he regularly features in a variety of media outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal.
Ed Yardeni sees one key floor before gold can recover
Yardeni feels the shiny yellow metal might need to fall further before its next leg higher.
The veteran analyst pointed to gold's break below its critical 200-day moving averageof $4,443.40 an ounce as a major technical warning.
When an asset falls behind that level, the worry is often over whether the uptrend will remain intact.
However, once the king metal broke that level below, Yardeni identified the next big support level.
"We reckon the next support is at $4,000," he told clients in a Sunday note.
For context, from Monday's level near $4,321.80, a drop to $4,000 would be another 7.4%. It also deepens a pullback that already includes a 3% Friday selloff along with a 4.9% weekly decline (the worst weekly slide since March 20).
Nevertheless, Yardeni's broader view remains mostly bullish.
He feels that once the dust settles on the Iran war, we are likely to see gold pick up the pace again.
He targets a $5,500 level by the end of this year and $10,000 by the end of the decade.
As a result, Yardeni sees meaningful support for gold in the near term.
While the metal could face additional downside in the short run, he believes the long-term bullish case remains firmly intact.
Wall Street's targets on gold
- Wells Fargo Investment Institute has a year-end 2026 gold target of $6,100 to $6,300 per ounce.
- Bank of America has a 12-month gold target of $6,000 per ounce.
- J.P. Morgan sees gold climbing toward $6,000 per ounce by the end of 2026.
- UBS has a 2026 gold target of $5,600 per ounce.
- Goldman Sachs has an end-2026 gold target of $5,400 per ounce.
- Citi has a near-term gold target of $4,000 per ounce.
Related: Moody's drops stunning take on the economy
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This story was originally published June 9, 2026 at 1:07 PM.