Gold ended a dramatic April, falling on the last day of the month to under the $US1,700 mark but still adding more than 6% in value.
Silver and copper also saw solid gains for the month despite weakness yesterday.
There was a dose of reality in the early GDP data from countries in Europe. The eurozone contracted at a record rate of 3.8% from the December quarter, France and Italy saw their second quarterly falls, which out them into recession, while the Spanish economy fell more than 4% from the end of 2019.
The European Central Bank revealed new plans to boost lending to banks and companies.
Inflation eased across Europe and the US in April. Oil continued to recover from the big losses mid-month but still lost ground overall.
The number of new jobs claims in the US rose 3.8 million last week after the 4.4 million gain the week before. That left 30 million on benefits, meaning US unemployment is close to 20%.
Many of those people have yet to start receiving their cheques because of processing delays in a number of US states, such as New York.
The Comex June contract lost $US19.20, or 1.1%, to settle at $US1,694.20 an ounce. Prices for metals did get a bump after the Fed’s policy actions on Wednesday, which came about a half-hour after the metal’s settlement on Comex.
For the month, based on the most-active contracts, prices were up 6.1%, which was the largest monthly percentage rise since August last year.
In other Comex trading, July silver fell 34.2 cents, or 2.2%, at $US14.973 an ounce, for a monthly rise of 5.8%, the biggest since last October.
July copper fell by 1.1% to $US2.344 a pound but was up 5.2% in April.
