GOLD and SILVER leapt Monday morning, setting fresh record highs against all and most currencies respectively after US President Trump again criticized the Federal Reserve and Nato-Russia tensions worsened in the Baltic.

Gold today hit its 9th new daily record in 16 sessions so far this September at London's 10:30 bullion benchmarking auction, fixing around $3721 per Troy ounce and then holding that price at the City's 3pm fix.

Silver then traded above $43.70 per Troy ounce around London's midday fixing, its highest benchmarking since the 3-decade peak hit at the top of spring 2011's silver price surge.

That put the more industrially-useful precious metal at fresh all-time silver highs in China's Yuan, Japanese Yen, UK Pounds, Indian Rupees and most other currencies outside the US Dollar and the Euro.

The United Nations meanwhile held an emergency session after Nato member Estonia said Russian fighter jets breached its airspace on Friday, extending this month's incursions over Poland and met by fighter jets from military ally Germany.

"He's doing a great job, his vote was a very good one," said Trump of new Federal Reserve governor Stephen Miran when asked Friday if he wants to appoint Miran − who also heads Trump's own Council of Economic Advisors − as the new Fed chair when Jerome Powell's term ends in May.

"The Fed should've done more. Too Late Powell is terrible, he's a terrible chair. But despite that we're powering through, we have another record stock market today, we're setting records many, many days in my administration."

The S&P500 index has now set 27 fresh record highs, gaining 11.1%, since Trump returned to the White House for his second term on 20th January.

Gold priced in Dollars had meantime set 34 new all-time highs by Friday's close, rising 34.9% before taking that move to 37.0% with today's fresh record above $3700.

A weekend report from the Reuters news agency claimed that Pentagon officials last month told European diplomats the US was about to cut security assistance to fellow Nato members and former Soviet bloc nations Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.

But "Yeah, I would," said Trump on Sunday − ahead of attending the commemorative rally for murdered right-wing activist Charlie Kirk − when asked if the US would assist its Nato allies along the military alliance's border with Russia.

Bloomberg today said that Russia "devised a plan" to hack next weekend's parliamentary elections in neighboring Moldova, which narrowly voted to seek European Union membership in a referendum last year.

Chinese interest rates were meantime kept unchanged on Monday by the People's Bank of China, with PBoC Governor Pan Gongsheng saying that monetary policy "will remain independent and data-driven."

Trump has "paused" weapons aid to Taiwan − claimed by Beijing as a 'breakaway' province of China − as part of trade deal negotiations with Chinese President Xi, the Washington Post claimed Friday.

Xi and Trump are now set for a face-to-face meeting in South Korea following a phonecall to discuss social media giant TikTok at the weekend.

Tomorrow Trump will address the UN General Assembly after the UK, Canada and Australia joined 150 other countries in formally "recognizing" the State of Palestine.

Now followed by Portugal and France, the move was rejected by Israel − accused of killing more than 60 Palestinians in the past 24 hours alone by the Hamas military and political group in Gaza − as the "latest attempt to impose a terrorist state."

Russia's latest airstrikes on Ukraine have now coincided with the UN General Assembly for the fourth year in a row, Kyiv's President Zelensky said today, calling for tougher economic sanctions against the oil-and-gas exporter.

With gold and silver prices rising on Monday, European stock markets fell together with the US Dollar, which snapped last week's rally off new 3.5-year lows following the Fed's decision to cut overnight borrowing costs by 0.25 points − only half the cut voted for by Miran.

US Treasury bond prices also fell, pushing up the yield offered by Washington's 10-year debt to the highest in almost 3 weeks at 4.15% per annum.