Investors' deep faith in a recession in the U.S. economy and in the Fed's dovish reversal acted as a guiding star for the XAUUSD bulls in November–January. Gold rose over this period by 21%, but as soon as cracks began to appear in the slender theory, it immediately collapsed to monthly lows. Strong statistics on the U.S. labor market in January, and the unwillingness of inflation to slow down as quickly as investors would like, put a spoke in the wheels of the precious metal.

It's hard to speculate about a recession when nonfarm payrolls are up by 517k per month, unemployment is falling to its lowest level since 1969, and average wages are up 4.6%, higher than 3.3% before the COVID-19 pandemic. Those who have been burying the U.S. economy are now struggling to justify themselves. Goldman Sachs has lowered the probability of a recession over the next 12 months to 25%. The market says that instead of a soft or hard landing, the plane of the U.S. economy is starting to gain altitude.

Under such conditions, the acceleration of January consumer prices to 0.5% and core inflation to 0.4% MoM looks logical. When domestic demand is high, prices have room to rise. They are not slowing down year-on-year the way investors would like. And the longer the path of inflation to the 2% target, the higher the likelihood of new local highs or bumps that will make the Fed nervous. How could it not, given the experience of the 1970s, when the central bank blinked, believing that the job was done and victory was achieved. The result is a new spike in CPI, a resumption of the cycle of monetary tightening, and another recession.

Dynamics of inflation in the United States

The Fed does not want to step on the old rake, so it does not take decisiveness now. New York Fed President John Williams does not rule out raising the federal funds rate to 5.5%. The futures market is giving a 94% probability of a 25bps hike in March, 80% in May and 52% in June. If these projections are confirmed, the USD index will continue to rise, and XAUUSD quotes will fall.

Fed Vice Chairman Lael Brainard's move to the White House economics team is also seen as bullish for the U.S. dollar. She had a less hawkish view than Fed Chairman Jerome Powell and that could affect the debate inside the FOMC.

Thus, the withdrawal of fears about an imminent recession and the shattered illusions about a dovish reversal by the Fed in 2023 deprived gold of its main trump cards. Against the background of the strengthening dollar and rising U.S. Treasury bond yields, the development of a pullback to the upward trend in the precious metal looks very likely.

Technically, on the daily chart of gold, the implementation of the Shark harmonic trading reversal pattern continues. The first of its two targets at 78.6% and 88.6% corresponds to $1775 per ounce. This gives grounds to sell the precious metal on the market as long as its quotes are below the $1,850 pivot point.