The value of gold decline on Friday morning amid the strengthening of the dollar against other world currencies.
The price of the April gold futures on the Comex dipped 0.65% to $1,689.7 per troy ounce. Earlier, the indicator was at its lowest level since April at $1,684. Meanwhile, May silver futures fell 0.87% to $25.24 an ounce.
Analysts attribute the current state in the precious metals market to the growth of the US dollar against the main world currencies by 1%. At the same time, the dollar against the yen jumped above £108 per dollar for the first time since July last year. Traditionally, the rising dollar is holding back the demand for gold, which is becoming less affordable for owners of other currencies.
The spectacular growth of the dollar is associated with the recent speech of US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, who said that the recovery of the global economy after the COVID-19 pandemic can lead to a noticeable increase in prices. Investors took Powell's statement as a prospect of the regulator's transition to a more strengthened monetary policy in the short term. As a result, major US stock indexes sank by 1-2%, and the yield on treasury government bonds increased along with the dollar exchange rate.
Today, investors are analyzing the indicators of US domestic statistics. The number of initial applications for unemployment benefits in the US in the week of February 21-27 increased imperceptibly to 745,000. The published data was another proof that the full recovery of the labor market is still quite far away.
A day earlier, gold reported a nine-month low on the back of a rising dollar and an increase in US Treasury bond yields. So, April futures for the main precious metal showed a drop of 0.9% - to $1,700.70 per ounce - after reaching an intraday low of $1,691.80. Meanwhile, the quotes of the most actively traded contracts were close to the low of June 2020.
The ICE dollar index rose 0.7%, thus indicating the possibility of ending the week with an increase of 0.7%, and the yield on 10-year US Treasury bonds crossed the 1.5% mark.
In this regard, analysts suggested that at the end of this week, the price of gold may decline by 1.9%, since a significant strengthening of the dollar and an increase in the yield of government bonds traditionally reduce its investment attractiveness.
Of course, the current year is still extremely unfortunate for gold, which has already lost about 10% and continues to look quite vulnerable.
