Gold gets pushed into a bull market,

Gold gets pushed into a bull market, but skeptics remain
August 27, 2013, 10:19 AM
http://blogs.marketwatch.com/thetell/2013/08/27/gold-gets-pushed-into-a-bull-market-but-skeptics-remain/

Talk of a gold GCQ3 bull market was floating around as the week started as the metal flirted with $1,400 an ounce. But $1,400 has come and gone as Syrian tensions have sent the metal soaring towards $1,423 an ounce.

Gold is now up just over 20% up from the lows — around $1,180 an ounce — reached by some contracts intraday in late June. The December gold contract on Comex was recently up $26.60 an ounce, or 1.9%, to $1,419.70 an ounce for the session. It had hit $1,423.

And that 20% gain equals bull market by the financial dictionary definition. The question is, will gold go the distance in this latest bull move?

Some brushed it off instantly.

“Bull market? That’s bull – Gold is down 17% YTD! ” notes Hedgeye Risk Management’s Keith McCullough

Others, were not so fast to dismiss the move.


@KIshtiaque the key number is $1,425 but with world events would not be surprised to see gold blow through it as shorts try to stop the bull


GFT’s technical analyst Fawad Razaqzada says the gold bull market has actually been in place for some time and was technically confirmed on a break above support and resistance atop $1,350 a couple of weeks ago. He says gold faces some resistance at the June high of $1,423, and some Fibonacci retracement levels, which may trigger long-side profit-taking.

“Thus gold needs to break and close above $1,423 if we are to see further gains going forward; otherwise it could be in for some healthy consolidation around these levels. The next bullish target is around $1,485/88 – the May 2013 peak,” says Razaqzada.

Jim Wyckoff, analyst with Kitco, says the near-term price trend for gold is up, “which means path of least resistance for prices will remain sideways to higher until uptrend is broken.”

Gold trying for $1,423 by Friday. That would mark an extremely bullish Monthly Swing Low and new bull market confirmation.


— Poly (@BobLoukas) August 27, 2013 (Here’s what a Monthly Swing Low looks like.)

I Know First was claiming vindication, given it predicted on July 23 that major commodities would gain 17% in 30 days, based on a predictive algorithms.

And for those who are thinking this might be a flash in the pan, Bullion Vault says debt ceiling and “poorly managed” tapering talk is also contributing. A day earlier, Grant Williams at Maudin Economics was listing any number of reasons why investors do not want to bet against gold, and much of it had to do with demand from India and other Asian nations.

Gold prices surge nearly 2%, breaking through key resistance levels as investors seek shelter on concerns about possible U.S. military action against Syria and the U.S. debt ceiling.

By Myra P. Saefong

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Gold futures surged nearly 2% an ounce Tuesday, moving into a bull market, as fears over possible U.S. military action against Syria and concerns over the U.S. debt ceiling drew investors into the perceived safety of the precious metal.

Gold for December delivery jumped $24.50, or 1.8%, to $1,417.60 an ounce on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange. Prices, which on Monday saw a loss of 0.2%, had climbed as high as $1,424 Tuesday.



Gold trades 20% up from the lows of around $1,180 reached by some futures contracts in late June, officially putting it into a bull market.

But the lowest official price recently, according to Edmund Moy, chief strategist at gold-backed IRA provider Morgan Gold, was the London P.M. gold fix at $1,192 an ounce on June 28 of this year. The gold price is “fixed” by five members of The London Gold Market Fixing Ltd. twice each day, in the morning and late afternoon.

So to be in a bull market, gold prices would have to be $1,430.40, Moy said.

Technically, a bull market definition is a rise in value of any market by at least 20%, while a bear market works in the opposite direction. Gold prices, however, are still down more than 15% this year.

Silver, which is typically much more volatile than gold because of the much-smaller size of its market than gold, saw bigger percentage gains Tuesday. September silver rose nearly 53 cents, or 2.2%, to $24.54 an ounce, extending Monday’s surge of 1.2%.

Bullish factors

“Among the factors for the gains in gold is the threat to Middle East stability as a result of the U.S. increasing tensions with Syria,” said Michael Haynes, chief executive officer at online precious-metals dealer APMEX Inc.

There’s also the “rhetoric around the increase in the debt ceiling and the implied threat that this debate will erupt into,” he said. On Monday, Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew said the U.S. government will hit the debt ceiling and be unable to borrow money to pay its bills in the middle of October unless Congress votes to increase the federal debt ceiling.

“The gold markets appear to be looking for reasons to go higher and we have these ‘ignition points’ at the moment,” said Haynes. “As we move past the Syrian threat and into the U.S. debt/budget discussion in September, which has longer term impact, the call on the bull market will be more evident.”

Gold had climbed in electronic trading late Monday after U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said the U.S. will hold the Syrian government accountable for its “undeniable” use of chemical weapons against civilians in rebel-held areas outside of Damascus last week.

Syria’s decision to allow United Nations inspectors came too late, and U.S. President Barack Obama will now decide how to respond, said Kerry. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad denied the use of chemical weapons and said the U.S. military will fail if it launches an attack against his country.



“Concerns over emerging markets are among the factors weighing on risk sentiment with the Indian rupee and Turkish lira hitting record lows against the dollar. The possibility of Western military action in response to the chemical weapons attack in Syria is also boosting the appetite for both the black and yellow gold,” said Fawad Razaqzada, technical analyst at GFT Markets. Black gold referred to oil, which rallied toward $109 a barrel Tuesday.

Razaqzada said it also looks like investors are backing out of equities, at least for Tuesday and if that keeps up, more risk capital could be reallocated by investors into rallying precious metals.

Gold has already moved past one of his resistance levels, which run between $1,415 and $1,425.

The Federal Reserve has said improvement in the economy should lead it to reducing asset purchases from their current pace of $85 billion a month, but soft data has kept alive debate about the timing and the amount of tapering. The earliest the Fed could start lowering bond purchases is in September.

Gold prices have been considered to be among the beneficiaries of stimulus from the Fed as well as from other central banks.

Economic data Tuesday was mixed. The U.S. consumer confidence index rose slightly in August to 81.5 from 80.0 in July. U.S. home prices increased 2.2% in June, another month of fast growth but slower than May, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller gauge.

Another sign that investors are moving back into gold came from Barclays on Monday, as they said exchange-traded products recorded their biggest daily inflow since Jan. 1 on Friday at 5.8 metric tons. Holdings of SPDR Gold Trust rose by 6.6 metric tons.

Shares of the gold-backed exchange-traded fund climbed 1.1% on Tuesday. Shares of metals miners were also higher, with the Philadelphia Gold and Silver Index also up 1.1%, with shares of Agnico-Eagle Mines Ltd. climbing 1.4%.

Back on Comex Tuesday, September copper rose less than a penny to $3.33 a pound.

October platinum bucked the upbeat trend among metals to fall back by $14.50, or 1%, to $1,530 an ounce while September palladium inched higher by $1.60, or 0.2%, at $747.65 an ounce.

http://stream.marketwatch.com/story/markets/SS-4-4/SS-4-37158/