Gold Volatile as Trade War Fears Battle With Strong USD

Gold prices wavered between losses and gains Monday, buoyed by heightened jitters about a potential trade war and uncertainty for the European Union following Italy’s divisive election, but pressured by a firmer U.S. dollar.

April gold GCJ8, -0.22% shed 50 cents, or less than 0.05%, to $1,322.90 an ounce after an earlier high near $1,329. The contract has been volatile considering that gold prices had settled at their lowest levels of the year just last Thursday, after recording the first monthly loss, in February, since October.

Yet gold futures settled with a sharp gain Friday, trimming the weekly loss to 0.5%, as the threat of a global trade war in the wake of U.S. steel and aluminum tariffs and potential retaliation pushed stocks and the dollar lower. U.S. stocks traded lower Monday, while the dollar index strengthened.

President Trump continued to tweet on the subject over the weekend, at one point threatening to slap a tariff on European autos, should the European Union try to retaliate to the new tariffs.



The trade-related market churning has underpinned a flight to the perceived safety for assets such as precious metals. Gold and silver also scored a fillip from buying from investors looking to hedge against rising prices that are typically associated with global trade tensions.

via MarketWatch

Content is for general information purposes only. It is not investment advice or a solution to buy or sell securities. Opinions are the authors; not necessarily that of OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc. or any of its affiliates, subsidiaries, officers or directors. If you would like to reproduce or redistribute any of the content found on MarketPulse, an award winning forex, commodities and global indices analysis and news site service produced by OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc., please access the RSS feed or contact us at info@marketpulse.com. Visit https://www.marketpulse.com/ to find out more about the beat of the global markets. © 2023 OANDA Business Information & Services Inc.

Alfonso Esparza

Alfonso Esparza

Senior Currency Analyst at Market Pulse
Alfonso Esparza specializes in macro forex strategies for North American and major currency pairs. Upon joining OANDA in 2007, Alfonso Esparza established the MarketPulseFX blog and he has since written extensively about central banks and global economic and political trends. Alfonso has also worked as a professional currency trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.
Alfonso Esparza