Gold fell as much as $25.07 to $901.08 in Asia before it rebounded to see a loss of just $5.15 at $921.00 by about 10AM EST in New York, but it then fell back off into the close and ended not far from that earlier low with a loss of 2.4%. Silver dropped to as low as $12.195 at about 8AM EST before it rose to almost unchanged at $12.577 by about noon EST, but it also fell back off into the close and ended with a loss of 1.8%. Euro gold fell to about €703, platinum lost $14 to $969, and copper fell nearly 4 cents to about $1.42. Gold and silver equities fell about 5% by early afternoon, but they then rebounded slightly in the last couple of hours of trade and ended with only a little over 3% loses. Oil fell back near $40 on continued worries over poor demand due to a weak economy. The U.S. dollar index and treasuries rose while the Dow and S&P fell on worries over the need for more substantial jobs cuts, but the Nasdaq ended with a decent gain on hopes that the technology sector will lead a rebound in the economy. Among the big names making news in the market today were Macy’s, Mattel, Honda, Ford, Eastbourne, and Renew Energy. The Commentary: “April Gold closed down 21.2 at 907.2. This was 0.7 up from the low and 13 off the high. March Silver finished down 0.15 at 12.415, 0.115 off the high and 0.065 up from the low. The gold market mostly forged an inside day range on Monday but at times the April contract was able to peak out below the prior session's lows. It certainly seemed like the better than expected US ISM readings tamped down flight to quality interest and in turn applied some additional pressure to gold prices. Some players suggested that gold was pressured by a combination of contract roll over action while others pointed to the early morning news of higher Russian gold production as the source of the selling interest. In the end seeing a better than expected ISM reading and seeing the US equity market return to unchanged on the day would seem to be cause for long liquidation of gold but at the same time the Dollar also gave up its early gains and that might have provided a measure of support to gold. The silver market spent a lot of time within the prior session's trading range, but for a brief time in the morning action, March silver actually probed below the Friday lows before managing a weak recovery bounce. With all the metals markets showing weakness on Monday and the outlook for the economy remaining suspect it is possible that part of the weakness in the silver market on Monday was the result of lingering deflationary fears. In fact, with weakness in grain prices, energy prices and the US equity market, deflation was certainly a more plausible argument than inflation in the first trading session of the new week.”- The Hightower Report, Futures Analysis and Forecasting

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