Gold futures had their worst day since last August with a very sharp fall on Comex in New York to below the $US1,300 an ounce level.
Gold futures dropped below the key $US1,300 mark on Friday to settle at their lowest in a month and half, down over 2% from a week ago—the sharpest weekly fall since August.
Gold lost about 0.7% in February, so the start to March wasn’t all that encouraging.
Gold (and sliver) only managed to briefly trim some of its earlier losses, as the US dollar’s weakness in the immediate wake of weaker-than-expected US manufacturing activity and consumer-sentiment readings proved to be short-lived. The greenback later recovered to close the day higher, but the week lower.
The Aussie dollar ended the week on 70.79 US cents, down half a cent over the week.
Despite the weaker than forecast surveys the US bond market sold off and the yield on the 10 year T bond ended up for the week and day by 9.9 and 5 points respectively at to 2.755%. The weekly rise was the biggest since the week ending November 2, last year according to FactSet data.
April gold fell $US16.90, or 1.3%, to settle at $US1,299.20 an ounce. It marked the lowest most-active contract settlement since in six weeks, according to FactSet data.
For the week, bullion was down about 2.5%, which was the steepest weekly percentage decline for a most-active contract since the week ended August 17, 2018.
On Friday, data showed the final reading of the University of Michigan consumer sentiment survey faded in February, with a 93.8 reading, activity in American manufacturing grew at the slowest pace since the election of President Donald Trump in November 2016, with survey’s expansion reading dipping to 54.2 in February from 56.6.
Comex May silver settled at $US15.256 an ounce, down 2.4% for the session, with prices losing around 4.1% for the week. Comex May copper ended at $US2.932 a pound, down 0.5% for the session, and down 0.7% for the week,
April platinum shed 1.3% to $US863.70 an ounce, but held on to a weekly rise of 2.1%, while June palladium continued to rise, adding 0.3% to end at $US1,506.10 an ounce on Friday and up 3% for the week.
A two day rebound on Thursday and Friday pushed global iron ore prices to a solid start to March and an up week after a flat performance in February.
Iron ore prices jumped 5.1% on Thursday and Friday, according to the Metal Bulletin’s Index price for 26% Fe ore delivered to northern China, ending a six-day sell-off.
MB 62% Fe Iron Ore Index jumped $US2.63 or 3% on Friday to $US87.92 a tonne. That was after a 2.1% rise on Thursday and took the gain for the week to 1.4%.
The index price of 62% ore was $86.65 a tonne, which was down on the $US88.16 a tonne for the previous Friday, February 15.
Iron ore prices were flat or fell in February despite the early boost from Vale’s January 25 mine disaster in Brazil.
But over the month, the price of 65% fines shed 5.5% (Vale’s favored high-grade ore) while 62% ore was flat.
The price of 58% Pilbara fines jumped $US1.88 a tonne of Friday to end at $77.85 a tonne. That was after a 12.1% rise in February which was good news for the likes of Fortescue because that is still its core product.
