By Carla Mozee and Saumya Vaishampayan, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Copper futures jumped to a two-month high on Thursday, pacing gains in the metals market after China reported stronger-than-expected trade figures for July.
By Carla Mozee and Saumya Vaishampayan, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Copper futures jumped to a two-month high on Thursday, pacing gains in the metals market after China reported stronger-than-expected trade figures for July.
The report this week of a much lower-than-expected U.S. trade deficit in June, which may well result in a sharp upward revision of the recently reported second-quarter GDP figure, has once again fueled discussions of a premature end to ‘QE3’, strategists at Commerzbank led by Eugen Weinberg wrote to clients Wednesday.
Commerzbank ahead of Thursday’s trade data from China said the country “took advantage of falling gold prices in June,” and imported 104.6 tons of gold on a net basis from Hong Kong, more than 2½ times as much as in the year-ago period, although the level was 4.2 tons less than in May.
China “remains the key driver of gold demand, and is also to some extent offsetting the weak investment demand,” the strategists said.
Elsewhere in the metals complex, September silver SIU3 +1.70% rose 36 cents, or 1.9%, to $19.87 an ounce and September palladium PAU3 +2.12% climbed $15.45, or 2.1%, to $738.60 an ounce.
October platinum PLV3 +2.02% tacked on $28.80, or 2%, to $1,467.20 an ounce.
Carla Mozee is a reporter for MarketWatch, based in Los Angeles. Follow her on Twitter @MWMozee.
Saumya Vaishampayan is a MarketWatch reporter based in New York. You can find her on Twitter @saumvaish.
