Gold & Silver Prices End Weds Flat, Euro Rises on Portuguese Debt Sale

From Chris Mullen at GoldSeek.com...

Gold Prices saw a $2.45 gain at $1386.95 per ounce in Asia on Wednesday, before chopping back lower in London and early New York trade to reach as low as $1376.63.

The Gold Price in Dollars then rallied back higher in the last few hours of trade and ended near its earlier high with a gain of 0.1%.

The Gold Price in Euros fell to about €1056 per ounce.

Silver climbed $0.27 to $29.81 and then fell to $29.37 per ounce before it also rallied back higher to end flat.

Platinum gained $33.50 to $1798.50, and copper gained 6 cents to about $4.40.

Gold Mining and silver equities fell over 1% in the first hour of trade before they rallied back higher, but they still ended with slight losses.

Oil continued higher after the US Energy Information Administration reported that domestic crude inventories fell 2.2 million barrels last week, gasoline inventories rose 5.1 million barrels, and distillates rose 2.7 million barrels.

The US Dollar index fell as the Euro rose after €1.25 billion of Portuguese government bonds sold with strong demand.

Treasuries fell as the Dow, Nasdaq, and S&P rose on easing European debt worries, but losses in bonds moderated after a $21 billion auction of new 10-year US debt drew a high yield of only 3.388% with a bid-to-cover ratio of 3.3 times.

New data showed US Import and Export prices slowing their rate of inflation in Dec. at 1.1% and 0.7% respectively. The Treasury's Dec. deficit of spending over revenues fell to $80 billion from Nov.'s $91.4bn.

The Federal Reserve's Beige Book of January analysis said holiday-season spending and manufacturing activity increased across the US, and business is now "cautiously optimistic" about the 2011 outlook.

Thursday at 08:30 EST brings Initial US Jobless Claims data for last week, expected at 415,000; the Trade Balance for November is then expected at minus $41.0 billion; and Producer Prices for December is expected to show a 0.8% rise from November.  Core PPI inflation is expected at 0.2% month-on-month.

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