Palladium was the only precious metal to record price gains both on Friday and for the week. Silver, meanwhile, performed the poorest for the day and the week. As for gold, the yellow metal experienced its fifth consecutive decline on Friday, marking its eighth loss in nine sessions.
On the final trading day of the week, gold for December delivery dipped by $2.30, or 0.1%, closing at $1,946.60 an ounce on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange. The settlement was the lowest since July 27.
"Gold is continuing its slow slide toward $1,900 an ounce as doubts remain as to whether the Federal Reserve still has one more interest rate increase left in its current cycle, even following yesterday’s encouraging U.S. inflation data," MarketWatch quoted Rupert Rowling, a market analyst at Kinesis Money, in emailed commentary.
On Thursday, the U.S. Labor Department reported that consumer prices had risen by 0.2% in July, matching the prior increase. Meanwhile, annual inflation accelerated in July, reaching 3.2% from the previous 3%.
This week, gold prices recorded a decline of 1.5%, compounding the losses of the preceding two weeks, which saw decreases of 1.2% last week and 0.3% in the week concluding on July 28. Year to date, they have advanced by 6.6%.
Looking forward to the upcoming week, Kitco News offers the following forecasts via their Wall Street vs. Main Street surveys:
"This week, 13 Wall Street analysts participated in the Kitco News Gold Survey. In a perfectly balanced vote, both bullish and bearish positions garnered four votes each, or 31%. At the same time, five analysts, or 38%, were neutral on gold for the coming week.
Meanwhile, 573 votes were cast in online polls. Of these, 320 respondents, or 56%, looked for gold to rise next week. Another 155, or 27%, expected it would be lower, while 98 voters, or 17%, were neutral in the near term."
Falling for the fourth time in five sessions, silver for September gave back 7.8 cents, or 0.3%, settling at $22.743 an ounce. Silver prices tumbled 4.1% this week, bringing their four-week total loss to a combined $2.45, or 9.7%. For the year to date, the precious metal has dropped by 5.4%.
In other precious metals, both on Friday and for the week:
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October platinum shed 20 cents, or 0.02%, to end at $914.60 an ounce, resulting in a weekly loss of 1.5%. On Tuesday, platinum at $892.70 an ounce registered its weakest close since Oct. 19, 2022.
- Up for a third day, palladium for September delivery rose by $3.60, or 0.3%, to end at $1,309.10 an ounce, boosting its weekly gain to 3.5%. On Tuesday, palladium at $1,218.10 an ounce marked its lowest finish since Jan. 3, 2019.
Reviewing their performance since the beginning of the year, platinum has declined by 15.5%, and palladium has dropped by 27.2%.
US Mint Bullion Sales in 2023
U.S. Mint published bullion sales were unchanged on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. On Tuesday, the Mint published the first bullion additions for August. Gains included 823,000 ounces in American Silver Eagles and a combined 15,000 ounces in American Gold Eagles.
The table below presents a breakdown of U.S. Mint bullion products sold, with columns indicating the number of coins sold (not total ounces) during different time periods.
| US Mint Bullion Sales (# of coins) | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Friday | May | June | This Week / August | July | 2023 Sales | |
| $50 American Eagle 1 Oz Gold Coin | 0 | 60,500 | 35,000 | 8,000 | 41,000 | 674,500 |
| $25 American Eagle 1/2 Oz Gold Coin | 0 | 18,000 | 1,000 | 2,000 | 0 | 75,000 |
| $10 American Eagle 1/4 Oz Gold Coin | 0 | 32,000 | 4,000 | 2,000 | 0 | 134,000 |
| $5 American Eagle 1/10 Oz Gold Coin | 0 | 80,000 | 60,000 | 55,000 | 0 | 440,000 |
| $50 American Buffalo 1 Oz Gold Coin | 0 | 47,000 | 17,000 | 0 | 16,500 | 293,000 |
| $1 American Eagle 1 Oz Silver Coin | 0 | 1,593,000 | 1,482,000 | 823,000 | 209,100,000 | 12,638,000 |
| $100 American Eagle 1 Oz Platinum Coin | 0 | 1,200 | 3,500 | 0 | 0 | 12,700 |
Maybe if the price for silver drops enough, we could once again make our coins out of COIN SILVER! I can still recall when the first of what we called “sandwich coins” started into circulation in the Boston area. I remember asking my father why they took the silver out of “silver” coins. Coin conscious even as a child. At least the common circulation coins don’t look like the “subway token” Presidential dollars. Do we still have a Billion of those stashed away in Gov’t warehouses? Worst coins from the Mint ever. I’ve seen real subway tokens that look no… Read more »
Major D,
The Federal Reserve about 10 years ago had 1.2 billion of the different “golden dollars” in its vaults. They even built a new vault building in the Dallas area for the storage overflow. Unfortunately, they simply do not circulate in this country.
The Fed should ship them to places like Ecuador where they use the U.S. dollar as their official currency & let them circulate there.
NumisdudeTX
If they made presidential toilet paper that would probably sell well. However those that dislike Obama and Harris may pass it up because it already looks used, despite wanting so bad to wipe their bung holes with them. Save us oh great Cornholio
Seems more like chuck e cheese tokens . Buy I doubt they’ll put money to metals. With how much it fluctuates it wouldn’t be viable. Remember when it was almost $50. Now half that. And once we got back to 0% interest to ensure biden gets resurrected, I mean re-erected, dang it, re-elected silver back down to $13 to $14. And when economy crashes again after businesses take advantage of the free cash and hook consumers into high cc balances, the rate will shoot back up and silver will go up again. Unless of course China and Russia take hold… Read more »
Dazed,
Don’t forget about our biggest, in my opinion, brain-dead move by letting all of our pharmaceutical companies move to China. Isn’t it convenient that so many of our populous is medicated daily and thus reliant on brother China for their daily fix. Yeah, we’re definitely the smartest country. If China wants to eliminate us as a threat, all they need do is ‘accidentally’ add a little fentanyl to your daily fix. Problem solved.
Kaiser,
The only thing I carry is plastic or my iPhone with Apple Pay downloaded. This is the 21st century after all. I touch more coins that I receive from the Mint than I do from coins that I carry in my pockets, because I rarely do. If we’re going to get technical, I do realize I’m not actually ‘touching’ the coins from the Mint, only their holders.
See, those loyalty rewards ‘rebate points/cash’ really do work. Of course, you do have to be disciplined financially and pay off your balance each month to make them beneficial.
Major D-
The Canadians did it the same way as the UK – they demonetized the dollar bills and the minor coins (UK has since demonetized the “round pound” due to counterfeiting). You can take them to the bank and change them into new money, only. You literally can’t buy anything with them. If there is no choice, you’ll use what’s available. Same way our money is legal – by Gov’t fiat. “It’s money because we say it’s money”.
If your numbers are correct, it sounds like an accounting error on the mints part. I know that’s a concept hard to acknowledge, the mint making a mistake. I see there are asking prices as low as $95 on feebay for these, what does that say about their demand? With less than 1 oz. of Ag in these, they should’ve been priced at $59.95 and they would’ve sold well, in my opinion. They are nice coins in proof condition, but I’m happy to own just one of each, at the $80 price point.
Major D, I like the ‘loyalty rewards’ idea, but could we make it retroactive to something like 10 -15 years ago? With all the $$$’s I’ve spent on the mint in that time period I should be getting a couple Buffalo’s sent my way! Lol. All good points though.
Those I want for personal collection I buy one of. Hoping the advancement in pressing results in a nice representation of the coin. Those that I believe will rise in price making it an investment I try to buy at least two. One to sell so that I may acquire other coins that would have otherwise been out of reach and the other one to keep in the collection so that I won’t have to pay crazy markups for it later when I discover I missed opportunity.
I don’t know about you dear, but it was mind blowing
Major D,
Love that comic strip pic! Lol. (So it was Einstein who discovered the T=$ mathematic equation).
Got my 5 Peace dollars on Friday & 5 Morgan dollars on Saturday, & they all look great, except for some lint inside some of the capsules & those fine black felt fibers that stick to the outside of the capsules. Quick delivery too! I say Kudos to the Mint overall on these beauties.
NumisdudeTX
Kaiser,
Since Mary Todd Lincoln dabbled in the occult, she said “I see my dead husband’s image on a 1-cent coin in the future.”
And he is still on them since 1909!
NumisdudeTX
Waiting on a “processing” U.S. Mint Morgan proof. Meantime, about $200 for a slabbed Morgan MS70 uncirculated on Apmex. Notified today coin available. Pretty. At $90, I’d buy it. My “demand” does not, however, remotely match the market “supply.” Whomever said “wait six months” for price discovery may be onto something. That said, how does MMBarr on eee-bay seem to have an endless supply of slabbed MS70 NGC 2021 Morgan CCs? The ONE coin I wanted in 2021; couldn’t get from Mint? Random observations, fwiw.
Correction: MBarrCoins. $325 seems the going rate all year for a slabbed 2021 Morgan CC MS70 NGC. Beautiful. Alas, I wanted one from a U.S. Mint order; lost out in that year’s online “adventure.” Almost bought in secondary market for $160. Local coin dealer said, “Price too high.” Alas, with this Morgan CC Privy, this 2021 year, price never pulled in. Sometimes, price discovery is “up”. Will that be same for 2023? We shall see.