Precious Metals Retreat, Still Post Strong Weekly Gains

Gold and silver futures settled modestly lower on Friday despite a further decline in the U.S. dollar as investors and traders took profits in precious metals.

However, despite the sell-off in precious metals, gold and silver finished sharply higher for the week.

COMEX gold for April delivery slid $9.90, or 0.6%, to $1,774.60 per ounce after trading as high as $1,784.25 early this morning.  In spite of the drop, the yellow metal closed the week with a gain of $51.00, or 2.9%.  Since the start of 2012, the most actively-traded gold futures contract has risen 13.3%.

COMEX silver for March delivery retreated $0.22, or 0.6%, to $35.34 per ounce.  However, gold’s sister precious metal posted a weekly advance of 6.4%.  In doing so, silver futures snapped a three-week losing streak and extended their year-to-date gain to 26.7%.

Other precious metals posted strong gains as well this week, with platinum and palladium rising 5.0% and 3.3%, respectively.

Among cyclical commodities, copper advanced $0.06, or 1.5%, to $3.86 per pound, bringing its weekly gain to 4.0%.

The standout performer in the commodities complex, however, was crude oil, which surged $1.94, or 1.7%, to $109.77 per barrel.  Oil’s rise was fueled in part by escalating geopolitical tensions in Iran.  For the week, light sweet crude climbed 6.3% and reached its highest level since early May 2011.