MUMBAI, Aug. 27 -- Three months ago, a 10-gram gold bar on India's Multi Commodity Exchange cost around Rs 1,58,000. On Wednesday it cost Rs 1,63,200, the highest print since mid-May, and Indian bullion traders are now weighing whether that three-month high is a ceiling or a staging point, with the Federal Reserve's Jackson Hole speech less than 48 hours away.

The immediate driver was oil, not gold. Brent crude fell 2.6% to $71.80 per barrel after Washington and Muscat confirmed the framework of a Hormuz corridor agreement, removing a disruption premium that had kept crude above $73 for most of the month. When crude slides and the dollar index loses traction, dropping near 102.9 on Wednesday, gold tends to fill the void in investor portf...