Gold prices rose on Monday as investors sought shelter from tumbling equities after U.S. President Donald Trump upended perceived progress on trade talks by threatening to raise tariffs on Chinese goods this week.
Gold for June delivery GCM9, +0.12% tacked on $2.80, or 0.2%, to $1,284.20 an ounce, after the contract rose 0.7% to settle at $1,281.30 an ounce on Friday last week. The front-month contract pared last week’s loss to 0.6%, according to FactSet data.
July silver SIN9, -0.72% fared less well, dipping 10 cents, or 0.7%, to $14.80 an ounce, after losing 0.7% last week.
Investors appeared to be leaning towards haven assets such as gold and the Japanese yen USDJPY, -0.30% which was climbing against the dollar, after a pair of tweets from Trump on Sunday indicated impatience with the progress of China-U.S. trade talks. Trump said he would lift tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese goods by Friday to 25% from 10%.
The ICE Dollar Index DXY, +0.12% was up modestly at 97.571.
U.S. stock futures hinted at a sharply lower open for Wall Street, with Dow Jones Industrial Average futures YMM9, -1.87% down 500 points and S&P 500 ESM9, -1.73% and Nasdaq-100 NQM9, -2.18% own by 1.8% and 2.2%, respectively. Oil prices CLM9, -1.31% were also under pressure. China stocks SHCOMP, -5.58% slid 5.6%, suffering the worst one-day loss since 2016.
July copper HGN9, -0.50% fell 0.7% to $2.797 a pound. If a trade deal is indeed on the ropes, that could also mean difficulties for China’s economy, and the country accounts for a bulk of demand for the industrial metal.
Elsewhere, July platinum PLN9, -0.34% fell 0.3% to $874.80 an ounce, while June palladium PAM9, -0.46% dropped 0.2% to $1,355 an ounce.
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