The gold market appears to be in a holding pattern around $1,700 an ounce and it could stay that way for most of the year, this according to Ole Hansen, head of commodity strategy at Saxo Bank.

Hansen said that investors have yet to fully understand the impact central banks and government actions around the world will have on financial markets.

“From a gold investment perspective, it's not really what's happening today or tomorrow or next month, it’s what lies ahead in six to 12 months and beyond,” he said. “We have right now, as I said, a stalemate because there are some negative factors, but I think they will fade before the positive factors do.”

The threat of a global depression and negative oil prices will keep inflation pressures under control, which could limit gold prices in the near-term, Hansen said. However, he added that gold’s future looks exceptionally bright in the long-term as inflation fears pick up as a result of the massive amount of liquidity that has flooded markets within the last month.

Hansen noted that he sees gold prices pushing to $1,800 an ounce by the end of this year, hitting a new record high by 2021 and sees a long-term gold price above $4,000 an ounce.

“If ever there was a time where it made sense to put a part of your savings into something tangible, then I think that is now,” he said. “The repercussions of what we're going through right now with the pandemic and the aftermath is going to be something that's going to be felt for at least a generation and potentially beyond.”