What is the Spot Price? How Our Tracker Works

Published on: September 5, 2025

The term "spot price" is fundamental to the world of precious metals, yet it can be confusing for new investors. The spot price is the current market price of a raw commodity—in this case, gold or silver—for immediate delivery. It's the price you would pay for one troy ounce of pure, un-fabricated metal right now.

How is the Spot Price Determined?

The spot price is not set by a single entity. It is a global price, determined by the trading of futures contracts on various commodity exchanges around the world, such as the COMEX in New York and the London Bullion Market. A futures contract is an agreement to buy or sell a commodity at a predetermined price at a specified time in the future. The price of the contract closest to expiration is typically used as the basis for the current spot price.

The market is open nearly 24 hours a day, 5 days a week, so the spot price is constantly fluctuating based on supply, demand, and speculative activity from traders worldwide.

How Our Tracker Provides a Live Price

Our gold and silver trackers work by pulling data from multiple reliable financial data providers in real-time. These providers aggregate the trading data from the major global commodity exchanges. Our system fetches this data every few seconds, ensuring that the price you see on our website is a current and accurate reflection of the global spot market. This allows you to make decisions based on the most up-to-date information available.

Spot Price vs. Retail Price

It's important to remember that you will never pay the exact spot price when buying physical metal. As we explain in our article on understanding premiums, all retail products (like coins and bars) are sold for the spot price *plus* a premium to cover manufacturing, distribution, and dealer costs. The spot price is the baseline; the final price is what you actually pay.