Gold futures extended losses for third straight session on Friday tumbling back below $1600 an ounce levels as mostly upbeat U.S. economic data took away precious metal’s investment appeal.
A firmer dollar added even more pressure to gold prices, as the market digested news on the nomination of Haruhiko Kuroda as governor at the Bank of Japan, which fanned dovish monetary-policy hopes.
Gold for delivery in April is trading down 7 cents at $ 1577.2 an ounce on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange. Yesterday, it dropped $17.60, or 1.1%, to $1,578.10 an ounce. It fell $19.80, or 1.2%, on Wednesday. Tracking the most-active contracts, prices fell about 5% for the month. They had already posted monthly declines for each of the last four months.
The upbeat US data releases yesterday depressed the gold prices. The U.S. economy grew in the final three months of 2012 instead of shrinking for the first time since the end of the recession as originally reported. But the growth was less than analysts expected.
The most recent weekly data issued Thursday showed that jobless claims dropped by 22,000 to 344,000, better than expected. And a measure of Chicago-area manufacturing accelerated in February to its highest since March.
In Japan Thursday, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe submitted the government’s choice for Bank of Japan governor to a parliamentary committee. Since he was elected late last year, Abe has been pressuring the central bank to take a more aggressive stance on deflation, and Kuroda recently stressed that the BOJ should increase and diversify its asset-buying program, its main policy tool with interest rates near zero.
MCX April delivery gold futures may open today’s session near Rs 29600 per 10 gram levels with support near Rs 29540-500 levels and resistance near s 29670 levels.
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