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Gold/Mining/Energy : Gold Price Monitor -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: long-gone who wrote (22578)	11/4/1998 5:42:00 PM
From: goldsnow	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116759

Stable gold masks fund sales and mine buybacks 12:14 p.m. Nov 04, 1998 Eastern LONDON, Nov 4 (Reuters) - Gold held near $290 an ounce during European trade on Wednesday as technically driven fund sales met physical demand and mine hedge buybacks in steady trade, dealers said. London gold fixed at $289.40 a troy ounce in the afternoon, down on the morning's $290.10. Strength in the Australian dollar and South African rand took local gold prices in those major producing countries to seven and four-month lows respectively, encouraging miners to buy back forward hedge positions to bank profits, dealers said. ''The rally in the Aussie dollar has given us some support, along with physical demand,'' said one London dealer. ''There was some really good buying around all this morning, I think it was South African related because of the strong rand,'' said another London dealer. ''They sold in the middle of last week and bought it back today. They're just making the most of every angle,'' he added. One dealer said technically driven fund sales were pitched against producer buybacks, reported for U.S. dollar positions on Wednesday as well as rand and Australian dollar ones. ''There has been steady, technically driven fund selling into the market since we dropped below the 100-day moving average,'' said the dealer, referring to Monday's drop through $291.00 during late U.S. trade. Spot gold briefly dipped on news that Canada's central bank sold 68,000 ounces of gold in October, knocking its reserves down to 2.5 million ounces. Spot gold was last at $289.40/$289.90 versus New York's Tuesday close of $288.70/$289.20. Palladium could fall $40 a troy ounce in the next two months if finely balanced demand from car makers, dentists, the chemical industry and investors is upset by end-of-year Russian sales, Standard Bank London said in a report. ''Palladium remains remarkably resilient but just how much metal are investors and end-users prepared to buy at what are still exceptionally high prices historically?'' ''We believe the current fine balance could easily be upset by a fall off in demand or a flood of Russian selling ahead of the year end, resulting in a steep fall in the price to $230-$240,'' the report added. Platinum could weaken to $320 according to Standard Bank's Trevor Pitts, who said the metal's short-covering rally from last Friday's low of $329.00 bid had not changed the outlook for the year end. Platinum was last firmer at $343.00/$345.00, up $5.00 on New York's previous close, while palladium was up $2.00 at $273.00/$278.00. Silver was just one cent up on New York, trading at $4.93/$4.96. ((Patrick Chalmers, London Newsroom +44 171 542 8057. london.commodities.desk+reuters.com)) Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.