Latest Headlines

Search

-- Posted Friday, 17 November 2006 | Digg This Article

The Metals:

CoT Reports: Gold | Silver

Gold traded mostly slightly lower in Asia and London and dipped to about $615 in early New York trade, but it then started to move higher in choppy trade and accomplished slight gains by the close to end with a gain of 0.14%.  Silver dropped about 15 cents in Access trade yesterday, held near $12.75 in Asia, and fell another 5-10 cents in London and early New York trade before it rebounded a bit into the close, but is still ended with a loss of 1.47%.

Euro gold remained at about €485, platinum gained $6 to $1,188 after trading about 4% lower earlier in the session, palladium lost $1 to $317, and copper gained roughly 4 cents to about $3.07 after dropping under $3.00 earlier in the session.

Gold and silver equities fell over 1.5% at the open, rose to find about 1% gains an hour into trading, fell back off to find about 1% losses again, rose back to find slight gains by early afternoon, and remained mostly slightly higher into the close.

The Economy:

Housing Starts plunged over 14%, more than 3 times estimates, to a 6 year low.  New home prices have fallen about 10% compared to one year ago.

All of this week’s economic reports:

Next week’s economic highlights include Leading Economic Indicators on Monday and Initial Jobless Claims and Michigan Sentiment on Wednesday.

Join SilverSeek.com & GoldSeek.com in San Francisco November 26-27!

The Markets:

Charts Courtesy of http://finance.yahoo.com/

Oil fell to 17 month lows on forecasts for warm winter weather in the US and on doubts over OPEC cuts, but early losses were cut in about half by the close.

The U.S. dollar index fell and treasuries rose on economically disappointing housing data.  Rumors also circulated that a troubled hedge fund was unwinding long dollar positions to cover losses.

The Dow, Nasdaq, and S&P fell at the open on concerns over the housing market, but lower oil and lower interest rates helped the Dow and S&P close slightly higher while the Nasdaq remained a bit lower at the close.  The Dow closed at a new all-time high.

Among the big names making news in the market Friday were Nymex, Sony, Wiley and Blackwell Publishing, Nike, HP, and Smucker.

The Commentary:

“Ahead of a Thanksgiving weekend trade quieted down, leaving the market ready for a quiet week with little activity expected.   But with the London market dominant, perhaps the true expression of the physical gold market will be made.   Certainly global influences will reign over U.S. ones.”- Julian D.W. Phillips, www.goldforecaster.com

“December Gold finished up 0.8 at 622.5, 0.4 off the high and 8 up from the low.

December Silver closed down 0.145 at 12.8. This was 0.2 up from the low and 0.08 off the high.

After early selling pressure tied to weak US economic data, lower base metal and energy prices, the gold market staged a recovery to close slightly higher on the day. The slump in Oct housing starts which fell 14.6% raised concerns that US growth is continuing to slow. Base metals have been hit hard lately on ideas of softening demand and rising inventories, but the selling pressure began to ease on Friday as well. Energy market also staged a recovery and with the Dollar falling sharply, the gold market was able to scrape back into positive territory. It must be encouraging to the bulls that gold prices basically rejected another test of the Nov lows.

Although silver prices closed lower Friday, the market was able to cut losses as platinum staged a sharp rally after falling sharply earlier in the session which took some of the selling pressure off the silver market. As an industrial metal, copper was hit hard by the weakness in the housing sector which also triggered spill over profit taking in the silver market. The silver market was over due for some profit taking after seeing a sharp price rally from the Oct lows. With the Dec contract holding above the 12.50, the chart pattern in silver market remains positive.”- The Hightower Report, Futures Analysis and Forecasting

GATA Posts:

New Congress seen likely to favor dollar devaluation

Dollar will remain primary reserve currency, Fed official tells bankers

GATA chairman reaches national radio audience in Canada on Saturday

Choking on hedge book, Newcrest stalls payment by 2 years

Resource Investor: Court finds Barrick doesn't own Chilean mine property

John Crudele: How you may have kinda saved $392.10

China doesn't seem to be moving out of the dollar yet

The Statistics:

As of close of business: 11/16/2006

Global Gold ETF Holdings

[WGC Sponsored ETF’s]

Note: No change in Total Tonnes from yesterday’s data.

COMEX Gold Trust (IAU)

Note: No change in Total Tonnes from yesterday’s data.

Silver Trust (SLV)

Note: Change in Total Tonnes from yesterday’s data: 46.6 tonnes were added to the trust.

The Stocks:

A free, new stock report on SilverCrest Mines by Peter Zihlmann posted at: http://www.goldreview.com/news/ZihlmannInvest/1163787161.php, Barrick’s (ABX) accusations about NovaGold (NG), Tanzanian Royalty’s (TRE) seventh tranche of their private placement, IAMGOLD’s (IAG) warrant conversion details and third quarter production results for Cambior, NovaGold’s (NG) comments on an Alaskan lawsuit, Vista Gold’s (VGZ) shareholder approved Nevada deal, Palmarejo’s (PJO.V) drill results, and Aquiline’s (AQI.TO) assumed operations at Navidad were among the big stories in the gold and silver mining industry making headlines Friday.

WINNERS