Gold fell to near 7-month lows Thursday as traders pushed the yellow toward mid $1,800 levels in a decisive break from the $1,900-an-ounce support decimated in the prior session.

Gold’s most-active futures contract on New York’s Comex, December, settled at $1,878.60 an ounce, down $12.30, or 0.6. Comex gold has lost almost 2% of its value in just 48 hours after taking nearly five weeks to build that since mid-August. The session low for December gold on Thursday was $1,874.55 — a bottom not seen by a most-active Comex since March.

The spot price of gold, which is more closely watched by some traders than futures, was at $1,866.97 by 16:00 ET (20:00 GMT), down $8.15, or 0.4%. It plumbed $1,857.74 earlier, also the lowest since March.

Bond market killing the gold market

“The bond market just killed any hopes of a short-term gold rebound,” said Ed Moya, analyst at online trading platform OANDA. “Gold was supposed to be close to finding a bottom but anxiety over surging bond rates has metal traders nervous that the rout may not be close to ending. The moves in the bond market are keeping the Treasury curve more pronounced at the long end, which is bad news for gold.”

U.S. Treasury yields, benchmarked to the U.S. 10-year note, shot to fresh 16-year highs on Thursday, on expectations over more rate hikes by the Federal Reserve. The bond market selloff continued even as the U.S. dollar retreated from November highs.

“Gold’s collapse below the $1,900 level has opened the door for technical selling towards the $1,870 region,” added Moya. :”If global bond yields are heading higher despite expectations that inflation will come down, current market positioning could allow a gold plunge towards the $1,800 region.”

Fed Chair Jerome Powell told a news conference last week that energy-driven inflation was one of the central bank’s bigger concerns. Oil prices hit more than one-year highs in Thursday’s session before retreating.

The Fed has raised interest rates 11 times between March 2022 and July 2023, adding a total of 5.25 percentage points to a prior base rate of just 0.25%. It could add another quarter point in November or December and more likely in 2024.