The Paper Gold (ETF) Market Leading the Rise in Gold Prices
So, even with tariffs making everything uncertain, gold prices hit record highs. This was on April 10, 2025, at 3:20 PM.
Even though the stock market went up on Wednesday because of some tariff delays, gold stayed strong. The price for gold to be delivered in April went up by $88.10, which is 3%, hitting $3,056.50 per ounce.
There’s this ETF called SPDR Gold Shares (GLD) that tracks gold bullion.
It found support at its 10-week moving average and went up over 4% this week.
By late Thursday trading, it was up more than 2% and hit a new high. Pretty solid, right?
Then there’s the VanEck Gold Miners ETF (GDX), which invests in gold mining companies.
It dropped below its 10week line but climbed back up, and this week it’s up 14%.
That’s a big move for something tied to gold miners.
The World Gold Council (WGC) said that in March, North America was the big player in pushing money into gold ETFs.
Royston Wild wrote about this on April 8, 2025, at 9:58 AM EDT.
The WGC pointed out that North America saw a lot of demand for gold bullion, so more cash flowed into these ETFs.
Globally, funds added 92 tons of gold worth $8 billion last month.
The WGC said that after four months of steady inflows, the total assets under management (AUM) for global gold ETFs reached a month end high of $345 billion, with holdings up 3% to 3,445 tons.
According to the WGC (and I think there was a typo in the original calling it the World Iron Ore Federation. it’s definitely the World Gold Council), physical gold holdings in March were the highest since May 2023.
The all-time high was around 3,915 tons back in October 2020 during the COVID-19 peak.
Gold prices jumped over 9% in March because of worries about trade tariffs and their effect on the world economy.
After President Donald Trump announced tariffs that were bigger than expected, gold hit a new high of around $3,171 per ounce on April 3.
It later bounced back to about $3,012 per ounce.
North America Leading the Charge
The WGC said ETF inflows in March were especially big in North America. Funds added 67 tons, which is nearly three-quarters of all global inflows.
That’s $6.5 billion, bringing their total AUM to $179 billion, with about 1,784 tons of gold bullion held by North American funds by the end of March.
They mentioned that this huge inflow came from things we’ve seen before: gold breaking past $3,000 per ounce with strong momentum, yields staying steady, and the dollar dropping to levels not seen since last November.
Tariff and war uncertainties kept supporting gold, and the WGC added that a weak stock market, due to growth and liquidity worries, pushed up demand for gold as a safe asset.
Europe Seeing Strong Fund Flows
In Europe, ETFs also got a lot of cash, thanks to investors in the UK, Germany, and Switzerland showing big interest.
Funds added 14 tons of precious metals worth $1 billion, pushing total AUM to $134 billion and physical holdings to 1,342 tons.
In the UK, the WGC said that even though the Bank of England didn’t change its base rate in March, concerns about U.S. tariffs, a slow stock market, and rising gold prices drove demand because the growth outlook looked murky.
The report also noted that with the European Central Bank cutting rates in March and U.S. tariff risks looming over growth, European investors kept piling into gold ETFs.
Asia Joining the Party
Asian funds saw an increase too, adding 10 tons worth $944 million last month. That brought their AUM to $25 billion and physical holdings to 251 tons.
The WGC said China and Japan led the demand in March, probably because gold prices spiked way higher than other assets that month, and global trade policy risks were growing.
They also figured inflation worries might have driven ETF inflows in Japan, while in India, profit-taking might have paused 11 straight months of inflows.
There’s a Forbes link from Royston Wild if you want to dig deeper: North America Drove Gold ETF Inflows in March, Says World Gold Council.
Trump Tariffs Reducing Risk, Q1 Gold ETF Inflows Hit Three-Year High
Ambar Warrick posted on April 8, 2025, at 8:09 PM that the WGC reported gold ETFs backed by physical assets saw their biggest inflows in three years in Q1 2025.
This was because fears of a U.S. led trade war made people less willing to take risks.
In the three months ending March 31, gold ETFs got about 226.5 tons of inflows, the most since Q1 2022 when the Russia-Ukraine war kicked off with 271.7 tons.
In dollars, that’s $21.1 billion in Q1, the highest since Q2 2020 when COVID-19 hit markets hard.
This surge pushed gold prices past $3,150 per ounce in recent weeks.
North American investors were the biggest contributors, followed by Europe and Asia.
Demand went up mainly because of concerns over Trump’s hefty tariffs on major global economies.
His reciprocal tariffs, announced last week, are set to start on April 9.
Deepening Trade War Leads to Record Gold ETF Inflows in China
On April 9, 2025, at 10:07 AM, it was posted that gold bullion has been on a huge rally this year thanks to trade and geopolitical tensions.
Chinese investors dumped a record amount of cash into gold-backed ETFs last week, drawn to its safety as global markets shook from big economies getting tough on the trade war.
Bloomberg estimated that inflows into the four main onshore gold ETFs, like HuaAn YiFu Gold ETF, hit 7.6 billion yuan (SGD 1.4 billion) last week the highest ever and it kept going strong this week.
This came after Trump’s high tariffs wiped trillions from global stock markets, sparking recession fears.
Gold’s always been a cultural thing in China, but now investors are leaning on it as a hedge against uncertainty.
Two big ETF providers, staying anonymous, said retail investors drove most of the recent inflows.
Chinese gold ETFs are smaller than global ones, but they’re growing fast additions this year are already four-fifths of last year’s total.
Michael Hsueh from Deutsche Bank said if this keeps up, Chinese ETFs might start rivaling developed market ETFs in influence.
Gold’s had an explosive year, up over 13%, with consecutive records pulling in funds from ETFs and central banks.
Even with a slight dip from global selling offsetting losses elsewhere, industry forecasts say there’s still room for it to climb.
So that’s the deal with gold and ETFs right now people are flocking to it with all this trade tension.