Gold News

Gold Bullion Hits 1st Monthly Loss in 5 as Equities Follow Worst Slump Since 2011 with Best Start Since 1987

GOLD BULLION headed for its first monthly loss in 5 on Thursday in London, nearing the end of February lower against most major currencies as new data said the United States' economy grew faster than analysts forecast at end-2018.
 
Instead of slowing to 2.3% annualized growth as predicted, US GDP expanded at a 2.6% pace in the fourth quarter, the BEA said Thursday.
 
Already slowing from Q3's pace of 3.4%, investment bank J.P.Morgan now expects US GDP growth to slow to just 1.5% in the first 3 months of 2019.
 
World stock markets also slipped with gold bullion on Thursday morning but held near a 2.6% gain for February, extending last month's rally from end-2018's slump, and following its  worst drop since 2011 with its strongest start to a year since 1987.
 
The US Dollar meantime fell to new February lows against its major peers after Donald Trump's former lawyer – a convicted liar himself – called him "a racist, a con man and a cheat", and the President's summit with North Korea's dictator Kim Jong Un ended early in Hanoi, Vietnam, with no deal on denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.
 
Nuclear power Pakistan says it will release tomorrow the Indian MiG fighter pilot it captured in this week's exchange of air strikes, calling it a "peace gesture" to its nuclear-armed neighbor.
 
Falling to $1321 per ounce in Dollar terms, gold also fell slightly this month against the Euro currency, dipping below €1160 for the first time in 2 weeks.
 
Chart of month-end gold prices in USD, GBP and EUR terms. Source: LBMA via St.Louis Fed
 
Over on the forex market, the British Pound meantime eased back from yesterday's 8-month high against the Dollar, helping gold bullion priced in Sterling terms rally £6 per ounce off an overnight drop to £990 – the cheapest since end-January.
 
Riven by infighting over anti-Semitism, the UK's opposition Labour Party today confirmed it will call for a second referendum on Brexit after losing a Parliamentary vote pressing for a Customs Union with the European Union after 29 March.
 
"It was all about the sanctions," Trump said today of Kim's offer to stop developing North Korea's nuclear weapons.
 
"They wanted the sanctions lifted in their entirety and we couldn't do that."
 
Spanish police are meantime investigating last Friday's violent assault and "interrogation" of staff at North Korea's embassy in Madrid by 10 masked assailants, apparently armed with fake guns.
 
"A fairly slow day once again in Asia today," says a gold bullion trading note from Swiss refiners and finance group MKS Pamp, "with the metals still remaining on the backfoot.
 
"Chinese participants were on the offer and gold slumped back below $1320." 
 
On the FX market Thursday China's Yuan edged back from its highest Dollar value since July. 
 
That held the Shanghai gold premium – meaning the extra paid for bullion already landed in the metal's No.1 consumer market versus London, the global trading hub – at $10 per ounce, just above its historic average.

Adrian Ash

Adrian Ash, BullionVault Gold News

Adrian Ash is director of research at BullionVault, the world-leading physical gold, silver and platinum market for private investors online. Formerly head of editorial at London's top publisher of private-investment advice, he was City correspondent for The Daily Reckoning from 2003 to 2008, and he has now been researching and writing daily analysis of precious metals and the wider financial markets for over 20 years. A frequent guest on BBC radio and television, Adrian is regularly quoted by the Financial Times, MarketWatch and many other respected news outlets, and his views from inside the bullion market have been sought by the Economist magazine, CNBC, Bloomberg, Germany's Handelsblatt and FAZ, plus Italy's Il Sole 24 Ore.

See the full archive of Adrian Ash articles on GoldNews.

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