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Will Target be open or closed on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day 2025?
Target has confirmed its 2025 Christmas store hours. Stores will operate with reduced hours on Christmas Eve and remain completely closed on Christmas Day nationwide. Normal business hours will resume on December 26, with same-day services available until early evening on Christmas Eve.
Target will maintain its strict policy of remaining closed nationwide during the Christmas day to allow its team members to spend time with their families.
According to Target’s official holiday store hours, stores nationwide will be open on Christmas Eve, Wednesday, December 24, 2025, but with significantly reduced hours.
Most locations will open at 7:00 a.m. and close promptly at 8:00 p.m. local time.
To accommodate last-minute shoppers, Target’s same-day services, including Drive Up and Order Pickup, will be available until the 8:00 p.m. closing time, provided orders are placed at least two hours in advance.
All stores will be closed for the entire 24 hours on Christmas Day, Thursday, December 25. Normal business hours will resume on Friday, December 26, with most stores reopening at 7:00 a.m. local time. You can verify the status of your specific location through the Target store finder.
Also Read: Will Best Buy be open or closed on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day 2025?
If you’ve pledged gold to secure a loan and the price of gold starts dropping, you have a problem. Maybe not an immediate crisis, but a real one that demands your attention. Most borrowers think about gold prices only when buying or selling jewelry. But if you have an active gold loan, the market price of gold is directly tied to how much trouble or comfort you’re sitting in.
The Loan-to-Value Ratio Is the Key Number
Every gold loan is built around a number called the loan-to-value ratio, or LTV. When you pledge gold ornaments or coins, the lender appraises them and gives you a loan worth a percentage of that appraised value. The Reserve Bank of India caps this at 75% for regulated lenders. So if your gold is worth ₹1,00,000 at the time of borrowing, you can receive up to ₹75,000 as a loan.
Now here’s the catch. That 75% cap isn’t just checked once. The value of your gold collateral moves with market prices every single day. When gold prices fall, the value of your pledged gold falls with it. Your loan amount stays the same, but the collateral backing it has shrunk. This means your effective LTV has quietly crept upward, possibly past the lender’s comfort zone.
When you initially took out an instant gold loan, the math worked in your favor. The gold was worth enough, the disbursement was quick, and the LTV was well within limits. A sustained drop in gold prices changes that math entirely.
What Happens When Your LTV Breaches the Limit
Lenders monitor the value of pledged gold regularly. When falling prices push your LTV above the permitted threshold, the lender will contact you. This isn’t a courtesy call. It’s a margin call, similar in principle to what stock traders face when their positions move against them.
You’ll typically be given a short window to restore the LTV ratio. There are two ways to do this. You can pledge additional gold to increase the collateral value, or you can make a partial repayment to reduce the outstanding loan amount. Either way, you need to bring that ratio back under 75%.
If you fail to act, the lender has the legal right to auction your gold. This is explicitly part of the loan agreement you signed. Lenders don’t want to auction your gold because the process is costly and regulated, but they will do it to protect their position. The auction typically happens after adequate notice, but the timeline can be uncomfortably short during periods of sharp price decline.
The Emotional and Financial Squeeze
There’s a psychological dimension here that doesn’t get discussed enough. Gold in Indian households is rarely just an asset. It carries sentimental weight. The prospect of losing family jewelry to an auction because gold prices dropped by 10% creates real distress. And that distress often leads to poor decisions, like taking a high-interest personal loan to cover the margin shortfall, which compounds the financial damage.
The smarter move is to keep a buffer. If you’re eligible for a loan at 75% LTV, borrowing at 60% or 65% gives you room to absorb a price correction without triggering a margin call. That buffer is the difference between sleeping peacefully and scrambling for cash during a downturn.
Interest Rates Don’t Change, But the Burden Feels Heavier
Here’s something that confuses many borrowers. A drop in gold prices does not change your gold loan interest rates. Your rate was fixed or agreed upon at the time of disbursement, and it stays the same regardless of what happens in the bullion market. The lender isn’t going to raise your rate because gold fell.
But the burden feels heavier in practice. If you’re forced to make a partial prepayment to fix your LTV, that’s money leaving your pocket that you hadn’t planned on spending. Your monthly interest obligation stays the same, your collateral is worth less, and now you’ve had to inject additional cash. The loan hasn’t technically become more expensive, but your total cost of borrowing has gone up because of the unplanned capital you had to deploy.
Timing Matters More Than Borrowers Realize
People tend to take gold loans when gold prices are high, which makes sense because you get a larger loan for the same quantity of gold. But this also means you’re borrowing at peak collateral value. Any subsequent decline immediately pressures your LTV. If gold has been on a strong rally, that’s actually the riskiest time to max out your borrowing limit.
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