Gold for December delivery moved above $1,230 last week, as expected. It rose to an intraday high of $1,239.50, but closed at $1,229.80 an ounce on Friday at the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange. Gold prices slipped $6.60 an ounce on Friday, the biggest single day fall in three weeks, as investors sold equities and commodities, including the precious metal, to retain cash on mounting evidence of an economic slowdown, according to a Bloomberg report.
Data in fold futures for December delivery for the week ended August 20 indicate profit-booking above $1,230. The metal was bought around the value area (1,220-1,230) on expectation of a limited downside risk. Traders bought the $1,230-strike call options for September delivery till Thursday and booked profit when the futures hit a seven-week high of $1,239.50. The short-selling was evident in the $1,240-strike put till Thursday, and short-covering when gold slip to an intra-day low of $1,223.60 on Friday.
The time-price opportunity (TPO), the area where gold speculators spent the most time trading, indicates strong resistance for December futures above $1,242.75. The volume-based support is expected around $1,223.60. Technically, the 21 days moving average data show strong resistance above $1,250 and support at $1,200. “The slightly stronger dollar is weighing on gold,” said Walter de Wet, an analyst at Standard Bank Plc in London. “With gold above $1,220 an ounce, the demand is slowing quite a bit” from physical buyers, he said.
“There’s still overhead resistance around $1,242, $1,245, “says Jon Nadler, senior analyst at Kitco.com. Goldman Sachs’ recent bullish gold forecast of $1,300 is in sharp contrast to the word coming out of its private wealth group, which is telling high net worth clients to bail out of gold, says Nadler. “If you have about $100-$125 potential upside in gold, you have to weigh that against a potential $200-$250 downside risk at the moment,” Nadler says.
Hedge-fund managers and other large speculators increased their net-long position in New York gold futures in the week ended August 17, according to US Commodity Futures Trading Commission data. Speculative long positions outnumbered short positions by 204,228 contracts on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange, the Washington-based commission said in its Commitments of Traders report. Net-long positions rose by 13,541 contracts, or 7 per cent, from a week earlier.