Gold News

Gold Bullion Holds $20 Rebound as Ukraine War Worsens, SEC Sues Coinbase

GOLD BULLION held onto yesterday's $20 rally in London on Tuesday, trading above $1960 as global stock markets fell with commodity prices as yesterday's weak economic data was followed by a sharp escalation of the war in Ukraine.
 
Ukraine's interior ministry accused Russia of shelling people trying to flee the now flooded area south of Kherson after the nearby Nova Kakhovka dam was destroyed overnight, adding to fears of an uncontained disaster at the neighboring Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in an act both sides quickly blamed on each other but possibly an attempt by Moscow to stall the Ukrainian forces' counter-offensive advances.
 
Russia's forces have elsewhere in occupied Ukraine been laying landmines on an "industrial" scale according to one analysis, while senior figures in the Kremlin-controlled media have offered to pay for accommodation for refugees from Russia's western border, now under attack from Ukraine-backed partisans, from where "People are running away in panic," according to one resident.
 
Monday's weak global services-sector reports for May were today followed by Germany's factory orders showing a 9.9% annual plunge in April, when the 19-nation Eurozone's retail sales flatlined from March.
 
That saw the gold price in Euros rise to €1840 per ounce, the top-end of its last 3 weeks' trading range, while UK Pound gold bullion prices rose to 3-session highs above £1580.
 
Gold bullion in May averaged a new record-high Euro price of €1833 – up by 11.9% from February 2022, when Russia's current invasion of neighboring Ukraine began – while the UK and US Dollar price slipped a little from their new records of April.
 
Chart of month-average gold bullion price in USD, GBP and EUR, rebased to 100 = Jan 2018. Source: BullionVault
 
"This is bigger than Ukraine. This is a war about freedom, and it's one we have to win," said US Republican presidential hopeful Nikki Haley overnight.
 
Currently polling just 4% among Republican voters against her ex-boss Donald Trump's 49% and Florida governor Ron Desantis on 19%, the former South Carolina governor and ex-US ambassador to the UN challenged her rivals to help avert "World War 3" by supporting Ukraine, rather than tacitly backing the Kremlin under Putin – someone Trump last week said he "got along with"
 
US finance regulator the SEC meantime sued crypto-exchange Coinbase for illegally brokering unregistered securities, adding to its clampdown on 'digital assets' brokers led by global giant Binance.
 
Bitcoin spiked down towards 3-month lows, while Coinbase stock (Nasdaq: COIN) dropped 15% in pre-market trade.
 
With global stock markets already slipping yesterday from start-June's 13-month high on the MSCI World Index, crude oil today gave back the rally it made on Monday's news of Saudi Arabia cutting its daily output by 1/10th to 9 million barrels per day from July.
 
Silver meantime held around last week's finish of $23.60 per ounce, while fellow industrial precious metals platinum and palladium diverged, with platinum prices peaking 4.4% above last week's 3-month low around $1000 while palladium bullion – which finds 2/5ths of its global mine supply from now heavily sanctioned Russia – retreated once more towards $1400 per ounce.
 
Longer-term interest rates edged back, cutting the US government's 10-year borrowing costs by 5 basis points from Monday's 1-week high of 3.75% per annum.
 

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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