Precious metals futures moved in the same direction on Friday as they ended for the week — higher for palladium and lower for gold, silver and platinum. Gold posted its biggest weekly decline this year.
Gold for April delivery shed $2.40, or nearly 0.2%, to settle at $1,330.30 an ounce on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange.
"Despite the hawkish stance by the Fed, which drove this move in the gold price, we are still above the $1,300 mark," Reuters quoted Think Markets’ chief market analyst Naeem Aslam, flagging a key support level.
Fed minutes released this week noted an increased likelihood for more interest rate hikes this year to combat an expectation of rising inflation and to support sustained economic expansion.
Gold futures dropped 1.9% this week after they surged 3.1% last week. The precious metal is 1.6% higher so far this year.
"We think some participants were surprised and unprepared, which created the largest weekly loss for this year," Aslam added.
In looking ahead to next week, Kitco News offers the following forecasts via their Wall Street vs. Main Street survey:
"Nineteen market professionals took part in the Wall Street survey. There were seven votes each, or 37%, for either higher or sideways. Another five voters, or 26%, looked for the metal to fall in the week ahead.
Exactly 900 voters took part in an online Main Street poll. A total of 423 voters, or 47%, said bullish. Another 366, or 41%, said lower, while 111, or 12%, were neutral."
Elsewhere, silver for March delivery lost 10.3 cents, or 0.6%, to finish at $16.484 an ounce. Silver futures declined about 1.4% this week after rallying 3.6% last week. They are 3.9% lower on the year to date.
In PGM futures on Friday and for the week:
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April platinum dipped 60 cents, or less than 0.1%, to $998.80 an ounce, for a 1.3% weekly loss.
- Palladium for March delivery gained $7.65, or 0.7%, to $1,041.15 an ounce, for a 0.5% weekly increase.
The two metals remain divided on the year with platinum 6.5% higher and palladium 1.9% lower.
London Precious Metals Prices
London precious metals prices ended mixed on Friday and from a week ago. In comparing their levels from Thursday PM to Friday PM:
- Gold declined 40 cents, or less than 0.1%, to $1,327.95 an ounce.
- Silver added 14.5 cents, or 0.9%, to $16.61 an ounce.
- Platinum was unchanged at $990 an ounce.
- Palladium added $8, or 0.8%, to $1,041 an ounce.
As for the week in LBMA metal prices, palladium gained 0.4% while the others registered losses reaching 1.8% for gold, 1.3% for silver, and 1.5% for platinum.
US Mint Bullion Sales in 2018
U.S. Mint bullion sales also ended mixed this week with gold coins moving slightly quicker and silver coins moving a lot slower. In week-over-week comparisons:
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Gold coins advanced by 2,500 ounces after turning up 2,000 ounces last week. All sales this week resulted from American Gold Eagles. Last week, splits included 1,500 ounces in American Gold Eagles and 500 ounces in American Gold Buffalos.
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American Silver Eagles advanced by only 70,000 coins after they climbed by 410,000 coins last week.
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In their debut last week, American Platinum Eagles recorded sales of 20,000 — matching the final mintages in years 2016 and 2017. The U.S. Mint has not indicated how many of the coins they will make available this year. No sales were registered this week.
On Monday, the U.S. Mint will release its first 2018-dated 5-ounce bullion silver coin. The piece depicts Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore in Michigan.
Below is a sales breakdown of U.S. bullion products with columns listing the number of coins sold during varying periods.
| US Mint Bullion Sales (# of coins) | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Friday | Last Week | This Week | December | January | February | 2018 Sales | |
| $100 American Eagle 1 Oz Platinum Coin | 0 | 20,000 | 0 | N/A | N/A | 20,000 | 20,000 |
| $50 American Eagle 1 Oz Gold Coin | 0 | 1,500 | 2,000 | 38,000 | 36,000 | 5,000 | 41,000 |
| $25 American Eagle 1/2 Oz Gold Coin | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3,000 | 16,000 | 0 | 16,000 |
| $10 American Eagle 1/4 Oz Gold Coin | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4,000 | 26,000 | 0 | 26,000 |
| $5 American Eagle 1/10 Oz Gold Coin | 0 | 0 | 5,000 | 25,000 | 80,000 | 5,000 | 85,000 |
| $50 American Buffalo 1 Oz Gold Coin | 0 | 500 | 0 | 14,000 | 24,000 | 2,000 | 26,000 |
| $1 American Eagle 1 Oz Silver Coin | 0 | 410,000 | 70,000 | 742,000 | 3,235,000 | 705,000 | 3,940,000 |
Two interesting factoids about gold:
There are an estimated ten million tons of gold buried in the seabeds of the world’s oceans, but at present there is no technically possible and/or economically feasible way to retrieve it.
Every single gram of gold found anywhere on earth was created as a result of a star going supernova many light years away and then deposited on our planet via asteroid impact.
And I’ll bet dollars to donuts right about now everyone is thinking “In exactly what universe does this somehow concern me?” 🙂
Old Collector – very interesting factoid for sure. As I enjoy researching all related to precious metals / international mining / numismatics / history…gold is truly “out of this world” lol Our earths core is the mother load for Gold and Platinum and hopefully not valued by an interstellar species / as logic would dictate, we are not the only ones spinning through space. lol I have been watching the trends related to the advancements of gold and other precious metals international mining. Canada has established the – Canada Peru Free Trade Agreement and for good reason. Canadian based mining… Read more »
Mouse,
Love Canadian coins, also Australian coins.
Joe C., Love all coins…always have. Collect stamps also, but they lack the textural, tactile appeal of coins. Mouse, I forgot about the heavy metals – some of them in the precious category – that ended up accumulating near the earth’s core when our planet, at first just a swirl of random cosmic dust (more specifically star dust, that which was left after the sun had swallowed its fill) coalesced, cooled, and hardened into the solid sphere it is now. As that process progressed some four billion years ago the gradually emerging, ever increasing force of earth’s gravity attracted the… Read more »
Old collector – definitely out of reach and for good reason. I always wonder why we have an affinity and pull to the element. food for thought.
Mouse
Mouse, The interesting thing here is that as far as being essential to life the precious metals are in fact pretty far down the “food chain”. Oxygen, carbon, and hydrogen are among the most vital, essential “must haves”, needed for our very existence, yet we treat the natural sources of these (mistakenly thought of as) “lesser” elements with a totally cavalier sense of entitlement, and consequently we have no problem with going about our merry way despoiling the very environment that provides these essential elements in such a manner that wouldn’t ever even think about extending to the way we… Read more »
Old Collector – gold and silver have and always will be recognized and valued as the ultimate form of currency by all countries / more so than any paper bills. It is imperative that we protect it. Wish I had an underground vault / better security and cool as hell lol
When it comes to mother earth and the brutal way that we treat her, one simple fact remains constant. It will be here long after we are gone.
Mouse
Silver lines around the earth, how much is gone from the earth, and in our draws? it’s the binding* that holds the earth together. Core of earth *platinum, gold outside of platinum, palladium outside of gold, *silver outside of palladium, & copper is outside of silver*, the crust *Gods earth, just like fresh bread* with a nice copper crust*. UFO,s – flying from the deep blue sea, out of mountain tops, the deep dark forest, & the desert, is earth a *citgo–station for precious metal*s that mankind can’t reach, for there fuel? & *mankind gets what rises to the top… Read more »
If we ever do run out of precious metals, we just have to wait for the next time two “local” neutron stars just happen to collide, and as simple and quick as bada bing bada bang, very soon after that explosive event, and anywhere from a few hundred thousand to a few billion years from now, an asteroid which formed itself out of some of that lovely supernova debris will embark on a swing through our solar system and hopefully end up making a very timely deposit of all that really good stuff – palladium (atomic #46), silver (47), platinum… Read more »
Old Collector – Joe: when it comes to precious metals, they are just that…precious. We get only what we get and like oil deposits, when they are gone they are gone. Gods creation of our mother earth is not an endless banquette for us to take with a fictional kitchen able to replace all yummy items when taken. As we will not see our total depletion of these precious metals in our life time, it will happen. There are-some interesting mining sites out there / showing large deposits of precious metals below the floor bed the oceans / but at… Read more »
Old Collector – I* be waiting! better start digging a *giant hole in my yard* to catch what rains in my*wishing*well*. Here, about the hole in the ground! weII! wELL! WELL!*$. That would be *penny*s from *Heaven*+*.smile*.
Mouse, It is my humble but carefully considered opinion that we will find asteroid mining, for example, to be scientifically and economically feasible long before we will either be able to or for that matter actually attempt to mine the ocean bottoms. We have already walked on the moon and we have managed to look back 14 billion years to the beginning of the universe with more ability, agility and above all success in general than the experience we have had exploring the deeper depths of our most massive bodies of water here on earth. I’m sure that Elon Musk,… Read more »
Joe Brown,
I’m going to throw my lot in with the cosmological, astrophysical and aviation community, keep a really close watch out, and get ready to net-catch the next mineral-rich meteor or asteroid while it’s still far above in the outer atmosphere, in other words before it has a chance to burn up/disintegrate on descent or falls into the hands of whoever’s back yard (or living room) it might land in.
whats a meteor rock going for now a day! a meteor watch is not cheap, i* sea. Old Collector – speaking of 2 local neutron stars collide! my 2 brain cells are do on the next full moon!*smile*buda*bing*.
Mouse & Joe Brown – It just occurred to me that precious metals are one of those things in life where you absolutely have to pick one side of the coin or another, you really can’t have it both ways, and you certainly can’t have your cake and eat it too. Which is to say, precious metals are that precisely because they are rare, so while we can celebrate their beauty as used in pieces of numismatic art and their usefulness as a singularly secure form of investment, both of these facets of their presence in the world are made… Read more »
Old Collector – precious metals serve purpose, we have to eat, house yourself, necessity of life ect. currency defines us as a species. I have friends that are self sufficient / home stead / and require limited amounts of anything. As they have life, they are off mentally lol, paranoid and isolated. We are a species that does not do well isolated. Precious metals pull us / we all have them circulating in our bodies / not gold and silver but others. Coins are truly works of art that bring us closer as a human culture / not just for… Read more »
Mouse – You are so right about the drawbacks of total isolation masquerading as survivalism and/or self-sufficiency. We humans are a social species; after all, even the monks among us live in their own co-operative communities. Also, that we are made of so many of the cosmically-produced elements is undeniable; as Carl Sagan so memorably (and beautifully) said, “We are all stardust”. And as for the precious metals specifically, it would indeed be extremely difficult if not downright impossible to find a single time in recorded human history when those elemental beauties did not play at least a very essential,… Read more »
Joe Brown – I totally forgot and entirely neglected to mention how much I liked and enjoyed the lyricism of your exceedingly evocative description of how the layers of precious metals might just actually exist in a atomic-weight-determined succession of what could be very roughly described and/or pictured as a sort of separate, individual, and relatively thin inner spheres between the mind-bogglingly immense, intermingled deposits of all the other types of matter that make up the earth’s core and its various other unique subterranean layers.
Old Collector – just some key ingredients when *god made his prefect *world we live in,*smile.
Even with all of the essential ingredients, it had to be mixed just right and cooked for the exactly correct amount of time, and that’s what I would call a miracle. 🙂