Gate Launches Precious Metals Zone: XAU/XAG Perpetual Contracts Analysis and All-Weather Trading New Choice

In the context of ongoing global macroeconomic uncertainties, Gate has introduced gold and silver perpetual contracts into the crypto trading system, providing traders with a new bridge connecting traditional safe-haven assets and digital finance.

Product Innovation: Gate Expands the Boundaries of Digital Assets

Recently, the global digital asset trading platform Gate officially launched the “Precious Metals Zone,” marking an important expansion of its product portfolio from pure cryptocurrencies to diversified financial assets. On January 14, 2026, the first batch of USDT-denominated gold (XAU) and silver (XAG) perpetual contracts was launched in this zone.

This move is not an isolated event but part of Gate’s ongoing strategy to deepen its TradFi (traditional finance) functionalities. Prior to this, Gate had gradually opened trading services for CFDs covering forex, indices, commodities, and popular stocks. Unlike previous TradFi products, the newly launched precious metals perpetual contracts fully adhere to crypto market trading logic: supporting up to 50x leverage and enabling truly 24/7 trading. This addresses the limitations of traditional precious metals markets, which are restricted by trading hours.

Gate states that this initiative aims to combine the hedging properties of traditional precious metals with the flexibility of crypto derivatives trading, providing users with new tools for cross-market asset allocation and trading strategy execution.

Contract Deep Dive: Core Features of Gold and Silver Perpetual Contracts

In Gate’s Precious Metals Zone, traders will encounter two core products: XAU/USDT (gold) and XAG/USDT (silver) perpetual contracts.

The key advantage of contract design lies in its standardization and the absence of delivery dates. Users do not need to handle physical gold or silver storage and delivery issues; they only need USDT margin to participate in global precious metal price fluctuations. This offers traders high capital efficiency. For example, in traditional futures markets, trading thresholds and complexity are higher, whereas Gate’s perpetual contracts simplify this process into familiar crypto trading modes.

Leverage options are another critical feature. Contracts support up to 50x flexible leverage, allowing traders to adjust capital efficiency based on their risk preferences and strategies. Of course, high leverage entails higher potential returns and risks, making proper position management essential. The product employs a funding rate mechanism similar to mainstream crypto perpetual contracts, with periodic funding exchanges to ensure the contract price remains closely anchored to the spot underlying asset’s price.

Pricing Foundation: Transparent Index Mechanism and Risk Control Logic

To ensure fair and transparent pricing and reduce market manipulation risks, Gate’s precious metals perpetual contracts do not rely on a single data source. Its index mechanism references multiple comprehensive precious metals trading market prices, processed through weighted averaging and algorithms, ultimately forming a stable and reliable mark price. The mark price is one of the core risk control indicators for perpetual contracts; it is mainly used to calculate unrealized profit and loss and trigger forced liquidation, rather than the latest trade price. This design effectively filters out short-term market noise and abnormal fluctuations, reducing “misliquidation” caused by sudden price movements.

Through this mechanism, Gate introduces the rigorous pricing logic of traditional financial assets into the crypto derivatives market. For traders, this means obtaining a relatively stable and predictable trading price basis within a highly volatile asset class.

Trading Advantages: 24/7 Market and Strategy Combinations

Round-the-clock 24/7 trading is a decisive advantage that sets Gate’s precious metals contracts apart from traditional markets. Regardless of whether the London or New York markets are open, users can respond instantly to sudden macroeconomic news and geopolitical events. This continuous trading creates unique opportunities. For example, when major events occur during the Asian trading session, traditional markets may be closed, but Gate’s users can already position or hedge risks.

From a strategic perspective, precious metals contracts offer a variety of combination possibilities:

• Directional speculation: Amplify gains or losses on gold or silver prices using leverage.
• Asset allocation and hedging: Incorporate precious metals with low correlation to crypto assets like Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) into investment portfolios to effectively diversify overall risk.
• Macro trend trading: Gold and silver prices are highly sensitive to global inflation expectations, real interest rates, the US dollar index, and geopolitical risks, providing traders with clear tools to trade macro themes.

According to Gate market data, as of January 15, 2026, Bitcoin’s price is reported at $96,520 with a market cap of $1.92 trillion; Ethereum’s price is reported at $3,328.79. While mainstream crypto assets remain high, the value of traditional safe-haven assets is being re-evaluated by the market. GateToken (GT), as the platform’s ecosystem token, is priced at $10.47 at the same time. The launch of the precious metals zone further enriches Gate’s diversified asset trading ecosystem and may attract a broader range of traditional traders to the platform and its ecosystem.

The mark price of gold perpetual contracts is generated by weighted data from multiple global exchanges and constantly updates on Gate’s trading terminal. The 50x leverage option for silver contracts is clearly displayed in the dropdown menu on the trading panel. In the top right corner of the trading interface, a subtle green indicator light remains on, silently announcing that this market is open 24/7. Here, safe-haven and speculative trading are intertwined more closely than ever, and the boundaries between traditional and frontier markets are quietly erased by a single contract code.