Daily Gold Update

Source: Marketwatch.com

San Francisco— After a minor setback in the previous session, gold futures resumed their climb Thursday to trade near $478 an ounce as weakness in the U.S. dollar spurred fresh investor interest in the metals.

"The fact remains that the dollar and gold continue to move in lock step with one another," said Dale Doelling, chief market technician at Trends In Commodities.

At last check, the dollar lost ground against the yen and the euro. Weakness in the greenback tends to drum up investment interest in the precious metals.

In metals trading, "the thing that really stands out here is the fact that the chart patterns for gold and silver have begun to mimic copper as the volatility continues to decline as their respective trends mature," said Doelling.

"Don't be surprised to see these patterns continue as the precious metals markets continue to log new multi-year and, eventually, new all-time highs," he said.

Gold for December delivery climbed as high as $477.80 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange, a level not seen since Oct. 17. It was last at $475.30, up $2.30. Prices lost $1.70 in the previous session, but rose in the three sessions prior to that.

Overall, gold continues to be the "engine" driving the precious metals group, said Peter Grandich, editor of the Grandich Letter — "thanks to strong physical demand and ever-increasing geopolitical concerns here and abroad."

December copper traded down 0.1 cent at $1.817 a pound, but that's after touching a record $1.845 a pound in the previous session.

Silver futures were also nearly flat, with the December contract down 0.3 cent to $7.86 an ounce.

December palladium traded at $229.50 an ounce, down $1.20, while the January contract for sister metal platinum was unchanged at $945 an ounce.

Tracking inventories, copper supplies were unchanged at 3,690 short tons as of late Wednesday, according to Nymex. Silver stocks were down 1,011 troy ounces at 116.3 million troy ounces, while gold inventories stood at 6.35 million troy ounces, up 3,344 troy ounces from the previous session.