Tehran's TEDPIX Rallied About 616% in 1398-99 and Gold Jumped 149% in 1403; Rasad Is Watching Four Markets for 1405 (Friday, October 2, 2026)

Iran's asset markets take turns rallying rather than moving together: Tehran's TEDPIX index rose about 616% from mid-September 2019 to mid-August 2020, and 18-karat gold gained about 149% in Iranian year 1403 (2024-25) and about 118% in 1404 (2025-26), both figures from Sahmino's own price archive. Now in October 2026 (Mehr 1405), after those earlier surges and with inflation running above 80%, the real question for an investor is which market rallies next, and that cannot be guessed; it has to be read from data.

Background

This rotation is not new. A prior Sahmino review of two decades of Iranian markets (20 Years, 6 Markets) found TEDPIX up roughly 382-fold and gold coins up roughly 190-fold from 1380 to 1400 (2001-2021), but that return never arrived evenly; each market took its turn. In 1396 and 1397 (2017-19), Tehran housing entered one of its sharpest price cycles (see Housing's Boom and Bust Cycle). In 1398 and 1399 (2019-2020) it was the bourse's turn. In 1401 (2022-23), the car market saw a marked price jump amid production and import constraints. In 1403 and 1404 (2024-26), gold rallied two years running. Sahmino's earlier look at 1399's "twin bubble" (That Year the Price Was at Its Peak) recorded the same rotation, with the bourse trading above a 35 price-to-earnings ratio at its height that year.

The numbers

Per Sahmino's own price archive: TEDPIX rose from about 290,000 points in mid-September 2019 (Shahrivar 1398) to over 2 million points by mid-August 2020 (Mordad 1399), a gain of about 616% in under a year. 18-karat gold rose from about 32.5 million rials at the end of Esfand 1402 (March 2024) to about 81.1 million rials at the end of Esfand 1403 (March 2025), a gain of about 149%, then to about 176.4 million rials by the end of Esfand 1404 (March 2026), up about 118% on the year. In the latest readings, 18-karat gold stood at about 257 million rials (25.7 million tomans) on October 1, 2026 (9 Mehr 1405), and the free-market dollar at about 2.58 million rials (258,500 tomans). TEDPIX closed the September 30, 2026 session (8 Mehr 1405) at about 7.767 million points. Meanwhile, year-on-year point-to-point inflation based on the consumer price index reached roughly 89% by the end of Mordad 1405 (late August 2026).

Drivers

These rotations are not random. Liquidity parked in one market tends to move to the next once that market looks saturated or risky; a weaker rial also pushes up the price of any imported or dollar-linked asset (gold, cars, and even export-oriented shares). Domestic gold is literally the product of two dollar-linked variables: the global gold price in dollars and the free dollar rate in rials; when both rise together, the domestic jump outruns either on its own, which is exactly the mechanism behind the 1403 and 1404 gold rallies. On the bourse, the main driver of the 98-99 rally was a wave of retail liquidity chasing a weaker rial and high inflation; TEDPIX traded above a 35 price-to-earnings ratio at that rally's peak, well above its historical average. In 1401, production and import constraints, per contemporaneous market reporting, put noticeable price pressure on the free car market too.

Outlook

Answering which market takes its turn in 1405 is not a guessing game; it requires tracking several variables together: the path of inflation and the exchange rate, company profit growth against their sector, each market's valuation gap from its own history, and the direction of liquidity flows. Sahmino's Rasad desk tracks exactly this in its "Signals" section: buy calls on names showing both profit growth and a price-to-earnings ratio below their sector's. In its latest read, Rasad filed buy calls on the September 30, 2026 (8 Mehr 1405) session on names including Ghalebar, Vahafez, Chenopa and Dekapsul, with a hit probability near 71% across a sample of 281 similar calls.

Verdict

The next rally cannot be predicted from a calendar pattern, but it can be spotted earlier than most by tracking inflation, the exchange rate, company profits and liquidity together. Sahmino's Rasad desk has carried a buy call on Vahafez (وحافظ) since the September 30, 2026 session, reference price 2,310 rials, target 2,661 rials, invalidation 2,164 rials, over a 15-session horizon, with a hit rate near 71% across a sample of 281 similar calls. The call stands as long as the price holds above its invalidation level; a close below it voids the thesis.

What to watch

• The path of the free dollar and monthly point-to-point inflation
• Quarterly profit reports of listed companies against their sector
• The gap between gold and coin prices and the global ounce (the premium)
• The target and invalidation levels of Rasad's buy calls in Signals