Gold prices ticked higher on Friday to close out a largely bearish week for the yellow metal, which posted week-on-week losses of around 2.2%.
Prices edged up to $2,352 an ounce on Friday, before easing back to around $2,338 an ounce by Friday evening. That compares with Thursday’s range of $2,310 to $2,340 an ounce.
The latter part of the week was characterised by relative price stability following Monday’s hefty fall from as high as $2,387 an ounce.
US monthly personal income figures and Core PCE price index figures released on Friday were both in line with market expectations, while personal spending was slightly above expectations. Collectively, the figures provided little convincing momentum for gold prices in either direction.
Recent strength in the gold price, which saw fresh all-time highs of over $2,400 an ounce on April 12, has been attributed to a surge in buying among retail investors on the Shanghai Futures Exchange. However, some commentators have noted that while trading volumes surged on the exchange, the number of outstanding contracts barely moved, indicating that day-trading may have been behind the price surge, rather than buy-and-hold investors.
Looking ahead, the markets will be watching out for Tuesday’s Euro Area quarterly GDP and monthly inflation figures, for the latest status update on the European economy. Probably of more significance will be Wednesday’s US ISM manufacturing PMI data for April and the JOLTs job openings numbers for March, for an update on the health of the US economy.
Economic conditions play into the calculus for interest rate decisions by central banks, and recent figures from interest rate traders suggest the markets now favour the first rate cut by the US Fed taking place in September, versus earlier expectations of June.
Frank’s experience covering the commodities markets spans 22 years, with a particular specialism in metals, carbon and energy markets. He has worked as a senior editor for S&P Global Commodity Insights (formerly Platts) and before this, at ICIS-LOR, a part of Reed Business Information (Reed Elsevier), where he covered the petrochemicals markets from 2003 to 2005.
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