How Is the Gold Price Set? Spot Price, the London Fix, and Price Discovery
The number you see quoted as "the gold price" is actually two related things: a continuously-updating spot price traded around the clock on global markets, and a twice-daily benchmark auction in London that sets the reference price much of the physical bullion industry actually settles contracts against.
Spot price: continuous, global, and never really closed
Gold trades nearly 24 hours a day across overlapping time zones -- Asian markets hand off to European markets, which hand off to North American markets. The "spot price" is simply the current price for immediate delivery, moving in real time as buyers and sellers trade futures and physical contracts on exchanges like COMEX and the OTC London market. It's this continuously moving number that live price trackers, including ours, display.
The LBMA Gold Price: a twice-daily benchmark auction
Separately, the London Bullion Market Association (LBMA) runs an official benchmark called the LBMA Gold Price, administered by ICE Benchmark Administration (IBA). It's set twice a day -- at 10:30am and 3:00pm UK time -- through an electronic, physically-settled auction where participating banks and trading firms submit bids and offers until supply and demand balance at a single clearing price. That price becomes the reference many contracts, from mining royalties to jewelry manufacturing, are settled against.
This system replaced the historic "London Gold Fix," a price-setting process that dated back to 1919, when IBA launched the current electronic auction on March 20, 2015. The name changed and the mechanism became fully electronic and auditable, but the basic idea -- a periodic, transparent benchmark the whole market can reference -- carried over.
Spot price and the LBMA Gold Price move together and rarely differ by much -- one is the continuous market price, the other is a formal snapshot of it taken twice a day for contracts that need a single, official reference number rather than a number that's different every second.
What actually moves the price
Day to day, gold prices respond to the same handful of forces: the strength of the U.S. dollar (gold is priced in dollars, so a weaker dollar tends to push the price up), interest rate expectations from the Federal Reserve and other central banks, inflation data, and safe-haven demand during geopolitical or financial stress. Central bank buying and selling -- national reserve banks adding to or trimming their own gold holdings -- adds a slower-moving but substantial layer of demand on top of day-to-day trading. See our central bank buying guide for more on that specific driver.
Frequently asked questions
Why does the price I see on a dealer's site differ slightly from the "official" spot price?
Most retail platforms display a live feed with a small delay or a slightly different data source, not the official twice-daily LBMA benchmark -- for everyday buying and selling, that live feed is what matters, not the formal benchmark.
Does the price include a premium?
No -- spot price is the raw metal price. Whatever you actually pay a seller includes a premium on top for minting, dealer costs, and market conditions. See our premium explainer for how that works on the silver side, which applies the same way to gold.
Where can I check the current price?
Our live prices page tracks gold, silver, platinum, and palladium continuously.
