Gold, crude oil prices fall

Oil and precious metals prices were down on Monday, with gold’s decline to a four-week low affecting other precious metals prices, while base metals prices managed an advance on the day.

Gold was down early, rose at mid-day, but ultimately dropped to $542.10/$543.00 per troy ounce in London late trading. The drop was blamed on investors decreasing their exposure to gold as the dollar rose. Gold prices have fallen over 5 percent since hitting a 25-year high of $574.60 earlier in February. However, the decline in gold prices has spurred jewelry makers, especially in Asia, to take advantages of lower prices to replenish their stocks, making the physical gold market stronger.

In response to the drop in gold prices, platinum was trading at $1,013/$1,018 per troy ounce, down from Friday’s late quote of $1,035/$1,039 in New York. Silver was down as well, by 20 cents to $0.14/$9.17 per troy ounce.

Base metals, however, were up for the day. Copper gained $31 to $4,869 per tonne, while aluminium was up $18 to $2,458 per tonne.

Crude oil prices fell despite cold weather and heavy snowfall in the northeast US over the weekend, a reflection of the mild winter overall and its resulting lower than usual demand for heating oil. Brent March contracts, which expired at the end of the trading day, lost 10 cents to $59.54 per barrel in late afternoon trade in London. April contract Brent crude, however, gained 1 cent to $61.07 per barrel.

By early afternoon in New York, West Texas Intermediate crude on the New York Mercantile Exchange had dropped 24 cents to $61.60 per barrel. However, March Nymex heating oil was up 1.49 cents to $1.6575 per gallon. March Nymex Henry Hub natural gas was up 5 cents to $7.37 per million British thermal units. Despite the gain, natural gas futures are nearly half of their $15.78 per mBtu, reached just two months ago. The drop has been laid to the mild winter in the US.