By Barbara Kollmeyer, MarketWatch
MADRID (MarketWatch)—Gold futures fell in European trading on Tuesday, in step with weakness in global stock markets and softer commodity prices after downbeat comments from a mining executive over China demand.
Gold futures for April delivery GCJ2 -1.01% fell $19 to $1,648 an ounce in electronic Comex trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Gold rose $11.50, or 0.7%, to settle at $1,667.30 on Monday.
Fueling the downturn for gold, the president of BHP Billiton Ltd.’s BHP -2.73% UK:BLT -3.37% iron-ore division, Ian Ashby, told reporters in Perth that China’s iron-ore demand is easing and that demand growth will slow to single digits. The news sent mining stocks lower in Asia and Europe, also weighing on commodity prices across the board.
Analysts at Fairfax said in emailed comments that gold was also coming off on a fall in gold-backed exchange-traded product holdings and amid an industry wide strike by Indian jewelers ”signaling a fall off in physical demand for the metal.”
The analysts said Indian jewelers extended the first nationwide strike in 7 years for 2 additional days, asking that the government cancel a new excise duty of 1% on non-branded gold jewelry.
They added that holdings in gold-backed exchange-traded products dropped by 5.86 tons, the most since Jan 24, to 2,404.31 tons last week.
Among other metals, May silver SIK2 -1.76% fell 60 cents, or nearly 2%, to $32.34 per ounce.
Copper for the same month HGK2 -1.66% fell 6 cents, or 1.7%, to 3.84 a pound.
April platinum PLJ2 -0.99% fell $18.70, or 1.1%, to $1,665.90 an ounce.
Sister metal palladium for June delivery PAM2 -0.90% fell $6.55, or 1%, to $701.50 an ounce.
