Gold Remains Range-Bound Amid US Military Deployment to Middle East, Tanker Hits

LONDON (October 2) On Friday, as the US-Iran conflict reached its 217th day, the United States began deploying a third aircraft carrier to the waters surrounding Iran, according to a US official cited by Al Jazeera. Both parties are currently considering further escalation and diplomatic engagement.

The official told Al Jazeera that the USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group left its San Diego base on Sunday, bound for the region, followed a day later by the Makin Island Marine Expeditionary Force, carrying more than 2,000 Marines.

By the end of November, the official said, three aircraft carriers and two amphibious landing groups will be positioned around Iran.

The official said the concentration of force would hand President Donald Trump a wider menu of options if he decides to act.

The new deployment includes thousands of troops and additional air power, including F-35 fighter jets, layered on top of the roughly 50,000 US service members already stationed in the region.

Media reports confirm that the goal is to keep military options “on the table” for Trump regardless of how diplomacy unfolds, with the Pentagon not planning to withdraw any assets even if an agreement with Iran is reached. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has said forces are “ready to go” should Trump order new strikes.

Trump himself has kept the threat alive in public. He told Fox News he believes the US is “going to win the war” with Iran “very soon”, while suggesting in other remarks that a return to military action “is possible” but something he would rather not spell out before November’s midterm elections.

Washington has paired the show of force with new economic pressure, sanctioning Iran’s rail and automotive conglomerates this week, as the Treasury Department called the new measures an effort to drain what remains of Tehran’s revenue.

Parallel to the military build-up, Iran has pushed a seven-day roadmap, conveyed through Qatar, that would see it reopen the Strait of Hormuz and resume nuclear talks in exchange for an end to the US naval blockade, sanctions relief and a regional ceasefire covering Lebanon and Yemen.

US Ambassador to the UN Mike Waltz told NBC the plan’s demand for frozen funds and sanctions relief was non-negotiable, noting “these aren’t just the United States’ sanctions … these are global sanctions”, and pointing to seven UN Security Council resolutions against an Iranian nuclear weapons programme.

Iran’s response, in the meantime, has been similarly two-pronged.

Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told NBC that Tehran was “fully prepared” to resume the war, before writing on X that “we did not come to New York to sell a war. We came to forge peace.”

Abas Aslani of the Center for Middle East Strategic Studies said the dispute has shifted from whether to negotiate to “who is going to abandon the primary leverage first”, while former US ambassador Richard Schmierer said Trump is caught between delaying past the midterms and the political cost of offering concessions that mirror a June deal he was already criticised for.

Nearly 70 percent of Americans now say the war has not been worth fighting, according to a new AP-NORC poll, with Trump brushing off the slide in his approval ratings by insisting “the pollsters are corrupt.”

The data comes as Trump kickstarts his midterm campaign trail in an all-in effort to galvanise the Republican base, stumping first in Texas and Oklahoma amid widespread voter anxiety surrounding the war on Iran’s mounting economic fallout.

The poll also indicated that, despite their frustration, two-thirds of Republicans surveyed said that higher than usual prices are due to factors outside of Trump’s control, with about one-third saying it was directly related to Trump’s policies.

The sombre numbers suggest the president remains deeply unpopular nationally, with some Republicans also faulting him for failing to deliver on promised relief.

Overall, more than half of adult respondents said the national economy and the country as a whole are worse off since President Trump took office again in 2025.

In an interview with TIME magazine, published on Thursday, Trump was asked if the deeply unwanted war would threaten his party’s chances in November, to which he initially responded, “It’s possible,” before adding that “it should help, because Iran will not have a nuclear weapon.”

Confronted with sliding poll numbers, Trump said that the “pollsters are corrupt” and that the bad polls “are fake”, adding that he would beat anybody running today “by 20 points”.

Trump has warned Iran to reach a deal with Washington, saying the confrontation would end “very soon” and that Tehran “won’t be around very long” if it fails to act “properly and smart”.

Oil prices edge higher, with Brent at $102.60 a barrel and WTI at $93.14, as markets weigh renewed Iran tensions, reports of additional US troops, and another aircraft carrier heading to the Middle East.

Yemen’s armed forces say they carried out 20 air attacks over the past three hours targeting Houthi movements, reinforcements, gatherings and military vehicles across several areas of Taiz province.

Yemen’s armed forces also say they intercepted Houthi drones over Aden, while the Saudi-led coalition says it destroyed a ballistic missile fired towards Khamis Mushait.

Regional governments and Islamic organisations have condemned the Houthi attack on infrastructure serving Medina, with Egypt, Qatar, Turkiye and others expressing support for Saudi Arabia.

At the same time, Israeli attacks continued across southern Lebanon, with artillery fire reported near Marjayoun, Mayfadoun, Nabatieh and Kfar Shouba, while Israeli air strikes again targeted al-Mansouri.

However, Dallas Federal Reserve President Lorie Logan said on Thursday that U.S. inflation still remained above the central bank’s annual target, and that the central bank still needed to hike rates sharply.

But Logan also noted that surging yields could help in keeping inflation in check, reducing the need to tighten monetary policy.

“I currently estimate the target range needs to rise an additional 50 basis points or more to appropriately balance the outlook and risks for our dual mandate goals,” Logan said in prepared remarks for an event at the Dallas Fed.

She noted that while inflation was falling, it remained well above the Fed’s 2% annual target, pushing the need to restore price stability. PCE price index data for August, released earlier this week, showed core prices cooled slightly, but remained well above 2%.

Logan noted that the economy and the labor market remained strong, and that Treasury yields had risen “significantly” in recent weeks.

“Some model-based decompositions also indicate a role for higher term premiums, in addition to higher risk-free rates… higher term premiums can slow the economy, reducing the need to tighten monetary policy,” Logan said.

Treasury yields rose sharply in recent weeks, as concerns over energy price risks from the U.S.-Iran conflict, along with overheated government and corporate borrowing, spurred deep selling in bond markets.

Undoubtedly, it is difficult to predict the next directional moves by gold futures, as both the micro and macro fundamentals look antagonistic but could continue to raise weakness this month, as the Gold Is Caught Between Softer Growth Data and a Still-Hawkish Fed Path.

Investing.com