Safe-haven gold on track for weekly gain

GOLD prices were steady on Friday (Nov 22) but still poised for a weekly gain, driven by safe-haven demand due to escalating geopolitical concerns, while market awaited clearer signals on the US interest rate outlook.

Spot gold was little changed at US$2,669.99 per ounce as at 0006 GMT and up over 4 per cent for the week so far. Bullion rose to over one-week high in the previous session.

US gold futures edged down by 0.1 per cent to US$2,672.00.

Data on Thursday showed that weekly initial jobless claims dropped 6,000 to a seasonally adjusted 213,000, a seven-month low, and below the 220,000 estimate of economists polled by Reuters, indicating job growth rebounded after being disrupted by hurricanes and labour strikes last month.

On the geopolitical level, Russia fired a hypersonic intermediate-range ballistic missile at the Ukrainian city of Dnipro on Thursday in response to the US and UK allowing Kyiv to strike Russian territory with advanced Western weapons, in a further escalation of the 33-month-old war.

Non-yielding assets such as bullion thrive in a lower interest rate environment and during times of geopolitical uncertainty.

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Meanwhile, Chicago Federal Reserve president Austan Goolsbee on Thursday reiterated his support for further interest rate cuts and his openness to slowing them down.

Traders now expect a 58 per cent chance of a 25-basis-point rate cut in December, as per the CME Fedwatch tool.

Investors will scan the US consumer sentiment (final) data, due later in the day, along with the remarks from Fed Gov. Michelle Bowman, for further clues on rate outlook.

SPDR Gold Trust, the world’s largest gold-backed exchange-traded fund, said its holdings rose 0.29 per cent to 877.97 tonnes on Thursday.

Spot silver fell 0.1 per cent to US$30.75 per ounce, platinum steadied at US$961.53 and palladium edged up 0.1 per cent to US$1,037.57. All three metals were on track for weekly rise. REUTERS