BackGold extends rally from biggest loss since 1981; platinum gains
Gold for delivery in February climbed 0.4% to $1,229.60 an ounce on Comex in New York, heading for a weekly gain of 1.3%, the most since 25 October
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Singapore: Gold extended its rally from the biggest annual loss in three decades on signs the slump is spurring demand. Platinum rose to the highest since November.
Turkey’s gold imports increased 64% in December, according to data on Thursday from the Istanbul Gold Exchange. The premium to take immediate delivery of gold in China was $20 an ounce on Friday, compared with last year’s average of $18.72. China was the biggest buyer of gold in 2012 after India, according to the World Gold Council.
Gold is part of the Asian mindset that it’s a way to store your wealth, Ed Moy, chief strategist at Morgan Gold, an Irvine, California-based investor that offers bullion for retirement accounts, said in an interview on Bloomberg Television’s First Up. Given the extremely strong demand from Asia, that should put some upward pressure on gold in the long term.
The metal for delivery in February climbed 0.4% to $1,229.60 an ounce by 7:38 am on Comex in New York, heading for a weekly gain of 1.3%, the most since 25 October.
Gold entered a bear market in April, and the 28% drop last year boosted jewelery, coin and bar demand. China’s consumption of jewelry, bars and coins rose 30 percent to 996.3 metric tons in the 12 months through September, while usage in India gained 24% to 977.6 tons, according to the London- based World Gold Council.
Coin sales
American Eagle gold-coin sales rose 17% in December from November, and Australia’s Perth Mint reported a 12% increase over the same period.
Investors lost faith in the metal last year as a store of value as equities rallied and economic recovery prompted the US Federal Reserve to pare its bond-buying program. Holdings in the 14 biggest gold-backed exchange-traded products tracked by Bloomberg contracted 33% in 2013, the data show.
Bullion slid from its 2011 all-time high partly because unprecedented money printing failed to stoke inflation. Expectations for gains in US consumer prices, as measured by the break-even rate for 10-year Treasury Inflation Protected Securities, reached a five-week low on Thursday.
India restricted imports of the metal last year to curb a record current-account deficit. The physical demand growth for jewellery in China has been strong and Indian consumption may rebound after the government crackdown on imports, Jodie Gunzberg, head of commodity indexes at S&P Dow Jones Indicies in New York, said in an e-mail on Friday.
Platinum futures rose 0.3% to $1,409 an ounce after climbing to $1,414.10 an ounce, the highest since 20 November. Silver gained 0.3% to $20.18 an ounce and palladium dropped less than 0.1% to $730.10 an ounce. BLOOMBERG
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