Gold Is Having A Huge Day

Gold is having a huge day.

On Thursday, surprise is the theme dominating markets, as the Swiss National Bank shocked markets early Thursday with a decision to no longer target an exchange rate of 1.20 against the euro for the Swiss franc. This decision sent currency markets into turmoil, as the franc rallied sharply against the euro and the dollar after having weakened of late.

The price of crude oil has also been all over the place, and US stocks have been volatile.

But the biggest winner on Thursday has been gold. Near 1:15 pm ET, the price of gold was up better than 2% to just above $1,260 an ounce, about $100 higher than its most recent low.

That low for gold, interestingly enough, was hit after a Swiss referendum on increasing the amount of gold the SNB is required to hold failed in late November.

In a presentation on Tuesday night, DoubleLine's Jeff Gundlach spoke a bit about gold, noting that while everyone has been talking about how much lower gold can go, the precious metal actually had a decent year in 2014, actually gaining ground in most currencies except the US dollar - the world's strongest currency last year.

Gundlach expects that gold will have a decent year in 2015, and gold is certainly off to a good start.