Gold fell on Friday after hitting a seven-week high earlier this week, as the dollar rose from multi-month lows, after monthly U.S. non-farm payrolls data was better-than-expected. Data from the U.S. Department of Labor showed the U.S. added 209 K jobs in July while the unemployment rate was 4.3 percent. Economists surveyed by Reuters had expected the report to show growth of 183,000 with the jobless rate ticking down to 4.3 percent, the lowest since March 2001. The better than expected job data gave the dollar a much needed boost and justifiably created some long liquidation for both gold and silver. Gold though was able to finish off its worst levels of the day after plunging to a daily low at 1259.8, closing approximately ten dollars lower on the day at 1264.8 basis December futures. The selloff in silver was a little more pronounced as September lost over .40 cents to close at 16.25 basis September futures. For the week, today’s losses broke weekly winning streaks for both metals as gold lost 10.70 cents for the week while silver lost 44.5 cents.
Next week is light on the economic calendar until later in the week. The focus will be on two fronts for metals. Traders will monitor if there is any follow through on this Dollar push to the upside while the the market overall will have a significant focus on Robert Mueller’s investigation into the President. So far equities have turned a blind eye as the Dow futures contract closed over 22,000 while the S&P finishes above 2470 with 2500 in sight.
Technical’s for next week come in as follows for both December gold and September silver. For December gold, support sits down first at 1256.1 A close under here sets up 1237.8 as the next level down. Resistance is up at 1276.6 and with a close above 1288.6. For September silver, support is down first at 1596.0 and below there at 1567.0. September silver futures has resistance up at 16.75 and with a close above 1725.0 the next level to the upside.
For those interested I hold a free weekly webinar on the grain market each Thursday at 3pm central time. Signup is free and a recording link will be emailed upon signup.