Weekly Round-Up: Positive Price Action for Precious and Base Metals

It’s been a good week for the gold price. After spiking last Friday on the back of a weak US jobs report, the yellow metal has continued to gain. As of 1:00 p.m. EST, it was sitting at $1,156.45 per ounce. 
Gold’s gain came amid the release of minutes from the US Federal Reserve’s September policy meeting. While there was some concern that they might negatively impact the gold price, thus far that has not been the case.
According to CNBC, the minutes show that while the Fed “thought the economy was close to warranting an interest rate hike in September … policymakers decided it was prudent to wait for evidence a global slowdown was not knocking America off course.” Most policymakers still believe an interest rate rise will come “by the end of the year.”
The silver price has also fared well this week. It rose to a high of $16.08 per ounce on Thursday, and as of 1:00 p.m. EST on Friday was sitting at $15.78.

On the base metals side, copper gained Friday following the announcement that Glencore (LSE:GLEN) plans to reduce its annual zinc output by 500,000 tonnes. According to The Wall Street Journal, the red metal “followed cues from zinc,” with COMEX copper futures for December delivery rising 3.1 percent to reach $2.4155 per pound.
Bob Haberkorn, a senior commodities broker with RJO Futures, told the news outlet, “[t]he market is a little spooked by what’s going on with Glencore. There’s concern about what’s to come from them on copper given the fact that they’re cutting back on zinc production.”
Finally, US oil prices were sitting at about $50 per barrel on Friday. Another Wall Street Journal article states that “key U.S. drilling data showed another decline,” also noting that “the oil market now appears to be looking past current seasonal weakness and growing stockpiles.”
That’s significant given that some analysts believe new buyers may enter the market if prices can hold above the $50-per-barrel level.

 
Securities Disclosure: I, Charlotte McLeod, hold no direct investment interest in any company mentioned in this article. 
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