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-- Posted Wednesday, 2 April 2008 | Digg This Article | Source: GoldSeek.com

The Metals:

Gold rose to $894.10 by late trade in Asia and early trade in London before it fell to as low as $880.90 by early trade in New York, but it then rallied higher for the rest of the day and ended at a new session high with a gain of 1.3%.  Silver rose to $17.132 and fell to $16.687 before it also rallied back higher for the rest of trade and ended with a gain of 1.7%.  Both metals have continued to rise about another 1% more in after hours access trade at the time of writing (4PM EST).

Euro gold rose near €572, platinum gained $47 to $1942, and copper gained roughly 6 cents to about $3.88.

Gold and silver equities steadily rose throughout trade and ended with over 4% gains.

The Economy:

Bernanke conceded the possibility of a recession and vigorously defended recent action taken with Bear Stearns in testimony before the Joint Economic Committee today.  Bernanke said the fed’s actions were necessary to insure the stability of the financial system and that if no action had been taken then the entire system could have collapsed due to counter party risk.

Tomorrow will be JP Morgan Chairman Dimon and Bear Stearns CEO Schwartz testifying before the senate banking committee about the recent moves by those companies.  Fed Chairman Bernanke, Secretary Treasurer Paulson, US Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Cox, and New York Federal Reserve Bank President Geithner will also be joining them.

Also tomorrow at 8:30AM EST is the Initial Jobless Claims report for 3/29 expected at 365,000 and at 10AM is the ISM Services report for March expected at 48.5.

The Markets:

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

Oil fell back below $100 immediately following the announcement that crude inventories built more than expected, but it soon followed gasoline higher and ended with notable gains “after the Energy Department reported an unexpected jump in gasoline demand.”  Oil inventories rose 7.4 million barrels, gasoline inventories fell 4.5 million barrels, distillates fell 1.6 million barrels, and refinery utilization rose 0.2% to 82.4%.

The U.S. dollar index rose in early trade after the better than expected ADP Employment report raised hopes that the government jobs report on Friday will come in better than the current expectations of a decrease of 50,000 payrolls, but the dollar then fell off in late trade and ended decently lower on recession worries and credit fears as the euro also found strength on higher than expected Euro-zone industrial producer prices.

Treasuries ended slightly lower on mixed economic data and different forecasts over future economic data.

The Dow, Nasdaq, and S&P traded mixed and near unchanged in morning action as traders digested Bernanke’s remarks and looked ahead to Friday’s jobs report and upcoming earnings results, but all three indices fell off slightly in afternoon trade and ended lower on worries over a late surge higher in oil and gold prices.

Among the big names making news in the market today were Monsanto, Fannie Mae, Best Buy, and Carmax.

The Commentary:

“My position on timing and price is that Gold will trade at USD $1650 before the second week of January 2011.

I am offering a $1,000,000USD wager to a financially qualified party that this will occur within the stated timeframe. Any party on Bloomberg, CNBC or CNN-Business stating an opposite opinion on the price of gold should be informed of this challenge.

Please communicate to ANY vocal bearish so-called gold expert that I challenge them to put their money on their views.

Any commentator unable to financially meet this challenge should not be opining. If they really knew the gold and currency market they could easily meet the challenge.

I am relying on you CIGAs to forward this challenge to any vocal bear, suggesting they stop flapping their lips by putting up or shutting up. It is one thing to hide behind a computer screen. It is another to bet the ranch on the view you promote.” -  Jim Sinclair, More at JSMineset.com

“April Gold finished up 12.3 at 895.2, equal to the high and equal to the low.

May Silver closed up 0.29 at 17.18. This was 0.36 up from the low and 0.01 off the high.

The gold market initially waffled around unchanged but seemed to gather a little momentum into mid session. Continued weakness in the Dollar, a slight bounce in energy prices and a more coordinated rise in grain prices seemed to provide a better roadmap for the metals markets. In fact, seeing the US equity market countervail the slightly disappointing US Factory Orders release might have helped the gold market discount macro economic slowing concerns. The bull camp in gold must take some solace in the fact that the US Fed Chairman suggested that the Fed's action had served to offset some of the credit crunch and yet that didn't seem to prompt renewed selling of gold from the flight to quality crowd.

The silver market seemed to garner a bit of support from the strength in gold prices but the trade might also have been emboldened by a recovery in energy prices, strength in equity prices and significantly more impressive strength in platinum and copper prices. In fact, seeing a long list of physical commodity markets trading moderately higher on Wednesday, in the face of more evidence of US slowing, was apparently enough to discourage a return to the broad based commodity selling pressure that recently dominated markets like silver.”- The Hightower Report, Futures Analysis and Forecasting

The Statistics:

As of close of business: 4/01/2008

Global Gold ETF Holdings

[WGC Sponsored ETF’s]

 Note: Change in Total Tonnes from yesterday’s data: The LSE added 0.16 tonnes.

COMEX Gold Trust (IAU)

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

Silver Trust (SLV)

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

The Stocks:

Newmont’s (NEM) comments on gold discovery, Gammon Gold’s (GRS) new board members, Tanzanian Royalty’s (TRE) board modification, Banro’s (BAA) drill results, Claude’s (CGR) executive appointment, Golden Star’s (GSS) COO appointment, Randgold’s (GOLD) reserves and resources update, Aura Silver’s (AUU.V) President and CEO appointment, and Fortuna’s (FVI.V) drill results were among the big stories in the gold and silver mining industry making headlines today.

WINNERS

LOSERS

Winners & Losers tracks NYSE and AMEX listed gold and silver mining stocks that trade over $1.

All of today's gold and silver stock news:

Duran Ventures and MacMillan Gold Report Positive Results From Hole 4 Extension at Aguila in Peru - More
- April 02, 2008 | Item | E-mail

Simberi Grants Options to an Officer of the Company - More
- April 02, 2008 | Item | E-mail

Matamec and JV Partner Goldcorp Plan Drilling Program on Matheson JV Property this Spring - More
- April 02, 2008 | Item | E-mail

Geoinformatics Reports Widespread Copper-Gold Intercepts From Recent Drilling on its Stockton Project in Utah - More
- April 02, 2008 | Item | E-mail

Altai Announces a Common Share Private Placement - More
- April 02, 2008 | Item | E-mail

Gammon Gold Announces Appointments of Two New Members to the Board of Directors - "Gammon Gold Inc. ("Gammon") (TSX:GAM and AMEX:GRS): is pleased to announce the appointment of Andre Falzon and Rene Marion to the Gammon Board of Directors as well as completing 2007 with no material SOX weaknesses." More
- April 02, 2008 | Item | E-mail

Tanzanian Royalty Modifies Board to Ensure Majority Are Independent Directors - "The Company (Toronto:TNX.TO - News) (AMEX:TRE - News) wishes to announce that the composition of its Board of Directors has been modified to ensure that the Board is comprised of a majority of independent directors. In order to ensure complete independence of the Board, Victoria Luis has elected to resign from the Board, without relinquishing her responsibilities as a key member of the Company's management team." More
- April 02, 2008 | Item | E-mail

U.S. Energy Corp. Announces Appointment of Fredrick Craft as Project Manager and Perry Anderson as Director of Community Relations - More
- April 02, 2008 | Item | E-mail

ICS Copper Systems Ltd. - Joint Venture With TransAfrican Minerals Limited - More
- April 02, 2008 | Item | E-mail

Acero-Martin Announces Closing of First Tranche of Non-Brokered Private Placement - More