Gold Price Outlook: Gold Breakout Rejected – XAU/USD Bulls Beware

Gold Technical Price Outlook: XAU/USD Near-term Trade Levels

• Gold price updated technical trade levels – Daily & Intraday Charts
• XAU/USD marks false breakout at key resistance – threat for larger pullback sub-1920
• New to Gold Trading? Get started with this Free How to Trade Gold -Beginners Guide

Gold prices are poised to close lower this week despite a rally of more than 3.2% into 2021 open with XAU/USD falling 0.8% to trade at 1887 in early New York trade on Friday. A dismal Non-Farm Payroll release offered little support with gold sliding to fresh weekly lows ahead of the US open and the threat remains for further losses in the days ahead. These are the updated targets and invalidation levels that matter on the XAU/USD technical charts heading into the close of the week. Review my latest Strategy Webinar for an in-depth breakdown of this gold technical setup and more.

Gold Price Chart - XAU/USD Daily

Chart Prepared by Michael Boutros, Technical Strategist; Gold on Tradingview

Technical Outlook: In my last Gold Price Outlook we noted that the XAU/USD rally had stretched into median-line resistance ahead of the 2020 close at 1884/88. A breakout into the yearly open rallied into the 61.8% Fibonacci retracement of the August decline at 1956 (intraday high registered at 1959) before marking and outside-day reversal lower with price now poised to mark a third consecutive daily decline.

Watch the Friday close with respect to 1884 with a close below risking a deeper setback towards 1861 and more significant support at the 61.8% retracement of the December rally at 1839- look for a larger reaction there IF reached. Resistance stands with the high-day reversal close at 1918 with a breach above 1956 needed to mark resumption of the broader uptrend towards 1998-2008.

Gold Price Chart - XAU/USD 240min

Notes: A closer look at Gold price action shows XAU/USD breaking below near-term ascending channel support extending off the November lows (red) with the decline taking out the monthly / yearly open at 1898. The threat remains for a deeper correction while below the 2011 high at 1920 but ultimately the trade remains constructive while within the broader pitchfork formation (blue) extending off the 2020 low.

Bottom line: The late-November gold rally may be vulnerable into the start of the year after responding to key Fibonacci resistance early in the week. From a trading standpoint, the risk remains for a larger setback while below the 1918/20 – be on the lookout for downside exhaustion ahead of the lower parallel / 1839IF price is indeed heading higher with an objective breach of the January opening-range highs needed to mark resumption.Review my latest Gold Weekly Price Outlook for a closer look at the longer-term XAU/USD technical trading levels.

For a complete breakdown of Michael’s trading strategy, review his Foundations of Technical Analysis series on Building a Trading Strategy

Gold Trader Sentiment – XAU/USD Price Chart

• A summary of IG Client Sentiment shows traders are net-long Gold- the ratio stands at +4.73 (82.56% of traders are long) – typically bearishreading
• Long positions are4.49% lower than yesterday and 14.20% higher from last week
• Short positions are 8.13% lower than yesterday and 17.07% lower from last week
• We typically take a contrarian view to crowd sentiment, and the fact traders are net-long suggests Gold prices may continue to fall. Traders are further net-long than yesterday and last week, and the combination of current positioning and recent changes gives us a stronger Gold-bearish contrarian trading bias from a sentiment standpoint.

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- Written by Michael Boutros, Technical Strategist with DailyFX

Follow Michael on Twitter @MBForex