Gold closed lower Thursday, and then added to losses in electronic trade as prices dropped to below $1,200 an ounce.
In its settlement on the trading floor, gold for August delivery declined $18.20, or 1.5%, to $1,211.60 an ounce on the Comex in New York. After-hours trading had the precious metal down at $1,196.10 an ounce before rebounding toward the $1,200 mark. Prices at either level had not been seen since August 2010.
"When the market gets into a trend, people just want to follow it, and now we’re in a severe downtrend, so the psychology has become terrible," Donald Selkin, who helps manage $3 billion of assets as chief market strategist at National Securities Corp., said in a telephone interview relayed on Bloomberg News. "If any of the big holders that are still in the ETF start getting forced to sell, it could be big, a wild card."
Silver tracked gold, though off modestly at its close. Silver for September delivery — now the new most-active contract — lost 6 cents, or 0.3%, to $18.55 an ounce. The precious metal later traded toward $18.33 an ounce but then returned near its settlement.
Bucking the downward trends, PGM’s registered robust gains:
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October platinum gained $21.70, or 1.7%, to $1,329.10 an ounce, trading between $1,304.20 and $1,332.70.
- September palladium soared $17.45, or 2.8%, to $650.70 an ounce, ranging from $629.40 and $657.70.
London Fix Precious Metals
London precious metals fixings ended lower. In contrasting the Wednesday PM to Thursday PM London Fix prices:
- Gold shed $3.50, or 03%, to $1,232.75 an ounce,
- Silver dipped 6 cents, or 0.3%, to $18.61 an ounce,
- Platinum declined $11, or 0.8%, to $1,318 an ounce, and
- Palladium fell $9, or 1.4%, to $643 an ounce
US Bullion Coin Sales in June
After a strong start earlier this week, sales totals for United States Mint bullion coins were unchanged for a second day. The following are daily, June and year-to-date bullion coin totals as provided by the United States Mint.
| American Eagle and Buffalo Bullion Coin Sales | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thursday Sales | Last Week | Week-To-Date Sales | June Sales | YTD Sales | |
| $50 American Eagle Gold Bullion Coins | 0 | 19,000 | 4,500 | 41,000 | 536,500 |
| $25 American Eagle Gold Bullion Coins | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 42,000 |
| $10 American Eagle Gold Bullion Coins | 0 | 4,000 | 2,000 | 6,000 | 84,000 |
| $5 American Eagle Gold Bullion Coins | 0 | 0 | 0 | 45,000 | 405,000 |
| $50 American Buffalo Gold Bullion Coins | 0 | 3,000 | 2,500 | 12,500 | 157,000 |
| White Mountain 5 oz. Silver Bullion Coins | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1,200 | 27,000 |
| Perry’s Victory 5 oz. Silver Bullion Coins | 0 | 300 | 0 | 14,200 | 14,200 |
| Great Basin 5 oz. Silver Bullion Coins | 0 | 0 | 9,900 | 9,900 | 9,900 |
| American Silver Eagle Bullion Coins | 0 | 800,000 | 847,000 | 3,275,000 | 25,043,500 |
Figures above are in the number of coins sold, not in ounces.
Since the price of Gold and Silver started dropping, I have not noticed any difference in prices. Should these companies, sell for less and make less, for what they paid for? Yes! They damn sure should! The sure as hell raise their prices for their stock, even though their stock has been in hand, long before the price rise or the price lowering. I went to a web site, of a very well known coin exchange, and they were selling Canadian Maple Leafs, 1oz for $122.00 for five. I thought that was a nice fair price, considering they were selling… Read more »
Basic rule of economics – always raise your prices, never lower them.
Bullion….go to goldsilver.com. Royal Canadian Mint 100 oz bars under $2,000. Looks like the best deal in town right now….
like the stock market. the paper manipulators are the controllers. like this one. they keep shorting. someday they have to buy it back. the price will go and bounce up strongly. don’t sell. price of gold should go up over $1400.00 an ounce this year. but usually the small guys will sell at low and buy at high. isn’t it?. that is why the public or outsiders are usually the losers. be smart. buy low and sell high.
Paper gold plummets, swan dives and then physical soars into the stratosphere. Meanwhile in India they are banning buying gold coins July 1. The central ponzi scheme banks have a problem and that is the critical slowing down that all complex systems show right before they implode.
Lots of people bought coins when the price crashed in April. Now those people are seeing it crash another $200 since then, people are definitely weary of adding any more.
Coin buying is “not as active as I thought it would have been,” said Michael Kramer, president of Manfra, Tordella & Brookes (MTB), a major U.S. wholesale coin dealer in New York.
Ask yourself, “What is the end game?” For central banks it is to destroy confidence in gold and silver. That genuine money competes with their fiat money. How to do it? Drive prices down. How? Have their bed partner banks to manipulate paper futures contracts downward in price, usually during low volume hours of the trading day (overnight NY time). The unintended result is that Russia and China are buying physical gold hand over fist whenever the price goes down. So PHYSICAL supply is drying up, regardless of what paper contracts do. (As evidence, Germany wants its gold back from… Read more »
Since the price of both gold and silver are below production costs, production pretty much has to be suspended until the prices justify production again. Demand should easily outpace supply and the prices return to pre-price dump levels, and then some.
Precious metals are on sale now, and I’m getting as much as I can afford. I only hope the prices can stay down for a while, so I can get more.
I don’t know… At the beginning of 2009 (4 1/2 yrs ago) gold was selling for $865. And you’re saying that in 4 1/2 yrs production costs have gone up by a little over 40%? I don’t believe that. The economy tanked, inflation rolled almost to a stop, interest rates fell to 30 yr lows – I think gold can go down by another 20% or so to around $1000 or maybe even lower. May not happen, and probably not overnight, but I think there’s still room before prices bottom out.
The reason that Gold is dropping is that Stocks have regained confidence with investors. Investment funds have been purchasing stocks and have reduced their gold holdings. People in the US and abroad are more confident with our economy and the fear buying that had driven the price to $1900 an oz is gone. This is simple economics. A true democratic market of supply and demand. If you question this then try to sell an ounce of gold $1900…
Hey Jim. Gold was just below $900 in 2007, before the crash.