Gold rises, boosted by Iran dispute and oil prices
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Gold futures rose as much as $5 an ounce Monday as higher crude-oil prices and Iran's continuing standoff over its nuclear program boosted the metal's safe-haven allure.
Gold for April delivery was up $2.50 at $689.20 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange, after peaking at $691.80. On Friday, the contract touched a seven-month intraday high of $691.90 before closing up $3.70 at $686.70 an ounce, a gain of 2.1% for the week.
Gold rallied again "as oil provides background support, while Iran's nuclear program continues to draw safe-haven hedging," said James Moore, an analyst at TheBullionDesk.com.
"Those factors are likely to feature heavily in the week ahead, particularly as the United Nations may impose sanctions on the world's fourth-largest oil exporter," Moore said in a note to clients.
The five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council -- the U.S., Russia, China, France, and Britain -- as well as Germany, are meeting Monday in London to discuss ways to respond to Iran's refusal to halt its nuclear development program, the Associated Press reported. The six countries will probably discuss trade and arms sanctions against Iran, the AP reported.
The U.N.'s nuclear watchdog agency said last week that Iran has ignored a Security Council deadline to stop uranium enrichment and had instead expanded its program, the AP reported.
"The threat of a renewed round of anti-Iran sanctions and the potential for a disruption in crude-oil flow from the world's fourth-largest producer kept safe-haven buyers on the alert as we started the week," said Jon Nadler, an investment-products analyst at bullion dealer Kitco.com.
"The rhetoric coming from both sides of the nuclear development issue continues to become more heated and more confrontational," Nadler said, in e-mailed comments.
Tensions surrounding Iran's uranium enrichment program boosted energy prices Monday. Crude oil for April delivery was up 31 cents at $61.45 a barrel in New York, and reached a high of $61.75 earlier in the session.
April crude had advanced in the previous three sessions on Nymex, closing Friday at $61.14 a barrel, the highest level of the year, on worries about tightening supplies, Iran's nuclear program and violence in Nigeria.
See Futures Movers. "With the weather and geopolitical powder keg in place, oil is likely headed to $65 and gold to $700," Kevin Kerr, editor of MarketWatch's Global Resources Trader newsletter, said in e-mailed comments.
For now, "gold and silver are both capable of making big moves at any moment," said Peter Spina, chief investment strategist at GoldSeek.com, in e-mailed comments. "Prior record highs in early 2006 are well within reach at this time."
And overall, "the market has a definite upside bias here," he said. "If the market pulls back, it would indicate consolidation before the next big move higher."
Multiple factors to drive gold higher
On the currency markets, the dollar traded little changed against major European currencies early Monday, consolidating last week's losses. Traders awaited economic data later in the week for clues to the U.S. interest-rate outlook.
See Currencies. "Oil prices, dollar weakness, global interest-rate decisions, inflation concerns and other macroeconomic conditions will all help to drive gold prices higher in the coming months and years," said Blanchard Chairman and Chief Executive Donald W. Doyle.
"But it is the paradigm shift in the supply/demand aspects of the market that will allow those price increases to become sustained moves instead of simply price spikes," Doyle said.
Doyle said that slack central-bank gold sales, higher central bank gold purchases, flat to slumping mine production, and rising investor demand are the reasons why any significant metals price increases will have fundamental support, a very different scenario from the speculation-driven price spikes in April and May.
Other metals prices were mixed on Nymex. April platinum was up $7.40 at $1,245 an ounce, palladium saw its June contract fall 95 cents to $362.75. May copper was up 1.2 cents at $2.865 a pound.
Silver up for a second session
Silver prices headed higher for a second session, with the May contract up 7.4 cents at $14.81 an ounce. The contract's up around 9% in a month.
"As we expected silver is outperforming gold," said Neal Ryan, director of economic research at Blanchard, in e-mailed comments. "This should continue to happen over the short term as more investment dollars pour into this thin investment sector."
"We're still waiting on the elephant to jump into the bathtub with the silver market when we see prices spike up to the $18 per ounce level," he said. "Remember, on an inflation adjusted basis, the all time high for silver $54 per ounce realized in the early 1980s would be the equivalent of $130 per ounce today."
On the supply side, gold inventories dropped 100 troy ounces to stand at 7.48 million troy ounces as of late Friday, according to Nymex data. Silver supplies remained unchanged at 116 million troy ounces and copper stockpiles were unchanged at 36,631 short tons.
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