Federal Reserve officials remain divided over the pace of additional tightening after third-quarter US GDP grew at a 3.4% annualized rate and core PCE inflation held at 3.1%. St. Louis Fed President Alberto Musalem and Dallas Fed President Lorie Logan pushed for more immediate hikes, with Logan calling for two additional quarter-point moves, while Richmond Fed President Thomas Barkin and Fed Chair Kevin Warsh favored a more gradual approach. The Fed held rates at 3.75%-4.00% on 28 October, with two officials dissenting in favor of an immediate hike.
Those hawkish signals, combined with a steep technology-led equity selloff, hit precious metals hard. Spot gold closed Friday at $3,875.19 an ounce, down 3.7% for the week and roughly 7.2% for October, its lowest since October 2025. Silver slid about 5.8% to around $49.34, below $50 for the first time in 11 months. Intel's 28.6% drop helped spark forced selling, with Commerzbank saying margin-call liquidations likely exaggerated the decline. The dollar index was little changed and the 10-year Treasury yield held at 4.93%.
Other central banks added to the complex macro picture. The Bank of Japan kept rates at 1.25% but acknowledged its 2% inflation target has been met, fueling expectations for a hike to 2.00% by next summer. The ECB paused at 2.50% but left a December increase on the table. Markets now face the US midterm elections on 3 November and the October jobs report on 6 November, with a strong payrolls print likely to reinforce hawkish Fed bets.
For cryptocurrency markets, the macro backdrop is risk-off: persistent inflation, higher-for-longer rate expectations and forced deleveraging across risk assets tend to weigh on speculative positioning. However, no specific crypto asset was directly named in the underlying reports.
