Commodities may advance, paring the biggest quarterly drop since 2008, as German lawmakers approved an expansion of the European bailout fund, helping to prevent the debt crisis from worsening. The Standard & Poor’s GSCI Spot Index of 24 raw materials was down 0.1 percent at 12:27 p.m. in London, with agriculture, energy and livestock sectors higher. Raw sugar gained 2.4 percent and heating oil rose 0.6 percent. The lower house of German’s parliament granted the bailout fund powers to buy bonds in secondary markets, enable bank recapitalizations and offer precautionary credit lines. Before today, the GSCI dropped 9.8 percent since the end of June, the most since the fourth quarter of 2008, on speculation a European default would lead to recession, curbing demand. The German vote is “positive for the euro, risk appetite and commodities in general,” said Christin Tuxen, a commodity analyst at Danske Bank A/S in Copenhagen. “It was very much expected that they would back it.” Raw sugar climbed to 24.87cents a pound and heating oil went up to $2.836 a gallon. Brent oil jumped 0.5 percent to $104.28 a barrel in London. It will average $100 a barrel next year, compared with a previous projection of $130, because of increasing supply and weaker demand, Morgan Stanley analyst Hussein Allidina said today in a report. Wheat advanced 0.9 percent to $6.4425 a bushel in Chicago. Little or no rain has fallen in parts of Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas, the biggest producers of winter varieties, in the past 30 days, National Weather Service data show. Gold Advances Gold for immediate delivery rose 0.3 percent to $1,613.48 an ounce. Silver gained 0.7 percent to $30.06 an ounce. Investors are being attracted by gold prices of about $1,600, Soozhana Choi, head of commodities research for Asia at Deutsche Bank AG, said at a briefing in Singapore today. “Factors that have driven gold higher over the course of the past few years, these factors are still in place,” she said, referring to low real interest rates and central-bank buying. Industrial metals were mostly lower, with copper down 2 percent at $7,105 a metric ton and nickel declining 0.3 percent to $18,449 a ton. To contact the reporter on this story: Maria Kolesnikova in London at mkolesnikova@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Claudia Carpenter at ccarpenter2@bloomberg.net

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