By Claudia Assis, MarketWatch
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Gold futures edged lower Monday following steep gains in the previous session and a quarterly advance of 6.7%.
Gold futures for June delivery GCM2 +0.28% declined $2.90, or 0.2%, to $1,668.90 an ounce, partly reversing a 1% gain from Friday.
Gold is lacking “sufficient investment enthusiasm to be able to sideline the physical market as it did earlier in the year, thus in turn prices are struggling to gain momentum,” analysts at Barclays said in a note to clients.
In India, one of the world’s largest markets for the yellow metal, jewelers are expected to reopen for business after a two-week strike protesting an increase in duties, analysts at India’s ICICI Bank said in a note.
They expected gold to trade in a range between $1,650 and $1,690 an ounce.
Among the broader suite of metals, May silver SIK2 +0.50% declined 4 cents, or 0.2%, to $32.43 an ounce. May copper HGK2 +0.97% rose 3 cents, or 0.7%, to $3.85 a pound.
“Overall copper remains the strongest metal and should benefit from the better Chinese sentiment and by what is expected to be a strong jobs number out of the U.S. at week’s end,” analysts at RBC Capital Markets said.
Official manufacturing data in China showed the purchasing managers’ index in a fourth month of improvement, at 53.1 in March from 51 for February.
A final report from HSBC and financial-services consultant Markit showed a PMI at 48.3 in March, down from 49.6 in February. Read a report on the differences between the two surveys.
