Gold Ends Thurs Unchanged, Silver Adds 0.6%, as Dollar Falls, Stocks Gain

From Chris Mullen at GoldSeek.com...

Gold briefly saw slight gains in Asia on Thursday before it fell back off in London to see a loss of $12.40 an ounce, down as low as $982.60, by 06:00 EST.

The Gold Price then rallied higher for most of the rest of trade, and ended near its new session high of $997.50, virtually unchanged from Wednesday's close.

The Gold Price in Euros fell to €682 an ounce.

Silver priced in Dollars followed a similar pattern to gold, but rebounded from its overnight low of $16.03 to end near its session high of $16.68 with a gain of 0.6%.

Platinum gained $1.50 to $1282, and copper fell nearly 5 cents to about $2.86.

Gold Mining and silver equities rose over 3% by early afternoon and remained near their highs into the close.

Oil rose after the International Energy Agency (IEA) raised its demand forecast and the US reported that crude inventories fell a larger than expected 5.9 million barrels last week.

The US Dollar index fell again, dropping to its lowest level this year, as market participants continued to put cash to work and new data showed the fastest decline in America's trade balance since 1999, dragging it down 16% to minus $32bn in July from June's figure.

Treasury bonds added to notable gains after a 30-year note auction drew strong demand equal to 2.92 times the debt on offer at a yield of just 4.238%.

The Dow, Nasdaq, and S&P saw modest gains in morning trade after better-than-expected jobs data showed Initial US Jobless Claims at 550,000 last week, down from 576,000 previously.

US equities then added to their gains in afternoon trade after that successful bond auction.

Friday at 08:30 EST brings US Import & Export Prices for August, then at 09:55 come the Michigan Sentiment index for September, expected at 67.8.

Wholesale Inventories for July follows, expected to show a 1.0% decline, and at 14:00 comes the Treasury Budget for August, expected at -$150 billion.

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