Weekly Round-Up: Precious Metals Prices Down on Greece Uncertainty

The spot gold price dropped to a three-week low of $1,171.55 per ounce on Friday as Greek debt talks neared a crucial weekend deadline, Reuters reported.

Earlier in the day, the metal fell to $1,168.25, its lowest price since June 5. Meanwhile, gold futures for August delivery dropped $0.60 to hit $1,171.20.

Greece failed to reach a deal with its international creditors on Thursday, making this weekend a last-chance effort to avert a default next week. This issue has caused the euro to slide against the US dollar.

For its part, the silver price was down 0.7 percent on Friday at $15.73 per ounce.

Meanwhile, copper on the London Metal Exchange fell 0.5 percent to trade at $5,744 per tonne, according to Reuters. The drop came as Chinese stocks posted some of their worst losses in seven years. China is the largest purchaser and producer of copper in the world.

Copper on the COMEX climbed 0.7 percent to reach $2.64 per pound; that puts the metal on track for a weekly gain of more than 2 percent, as per MarketWatch.

Finally, the Brent crude price fell by $0.50 to hit $62.70 per barrel, another Reuters article states. The fall came after a drop of $0.29 the session before. Investors are awaiting the outcome of Iranian nuclear talks, which could lead to a significant increase in Iranian crude exports.

“A significant amount on unneeded oil will flow into the global markets in a relatively short time frame as Iran has a large volume of oil sitting in floating storage that is likely to hit the market very quickly,” said Dominick Chirichella of the Energy Management Institute.

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