Daily Gold Update

Source:Bill Musgrave, American Gold Exchange

AustinGold rose 0.4% to close at $1,800 as ECB tightening pressured the dollar, Treasury yields, and the stock market, spurring demand for alternative assets.

The European Central Bank said today that it will modestly reduce the monthly purchases of bonds because of generally improving financial conditions and rising inflation the in EU. Known as the pandemic emergency purchasing program, or PEPP, the ECB's version of quantitative easing is targeted to total 1.85 trillion euro through March 2022.

The dollar fell 0.2% against major rivals led by the euro as Forex traders were drawn toward ECB's relatively quicker monetary tightening. The Fed is still on the fence about when to taper QE. A weaker dollar supports gold and other composites by making them less expensive overseas.

Benchmark 10-year Treasury yields pulled back under 1.29% on the central bank policy differential and lingering worries about the Delta variant's effect on the recovery. Lower yields support gold by reducing the opportunity cost for hold it instead of bonds as a safe-haven assets.

The Dow, S&P 500, and Global Dow all slipped 0.3% on the prospect that the ECB's move may push the Fed to follow suit and start to remove the punchbowl of easy money.

Gold's gains were capped by a sharp drop in initial jobless claims, which fell under 310,000 last week for the first time since the pandemic struck.

The other precious metals were mixed, with silver adding 0.5% while platinum and palladium fell 0.2% and 4.2%, respectively.

At the Comex close: December gold gained $6.50 to $1,800; December silver added 12 cents, to $24.18; October platinum dropped $1.60 to $974.50; and December palladium lost $94.50 to $2,142.80 an ounce.