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

To: Eashoa' M'sheekha who wrote (30064)	3/15/1999 5:30:00 PM
From: Alex	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116893

3/15/99 - Closing N.Y. Metals: Gold, Silver Close Sharply Lower <Picture> New York-March 15-FWN--Comments from European officials about potential International Monetary Fund (IMF) sales of gold sent the yellow metal sharply lower here today, sources said. Sell stops contributed to the losses. Meanwhile, silver declined on apparent disappointment that an annual report by Warren Buffett"s Berkshire Hathaway did not give any clues on what happened to its position in the silver market. Also contributing to the softness in both markets was some of the Commitments of Traders (COT) data Friday, analysts said. Platinum followed gold and silver lower, but is also in a technical downtrend, contacts said. April gold fell $5.80 to settle at $287.60. Technically, the market turned lower after it was unable to push upward through major resistance of $296.50 Thursday, said Dave Meger, metals analyst with Alaron Trading. "From that fall, the market never really recovered," he continued. "We had a weak close Friday when we couldn"t push through there. And you"re seeing continuation of that today." Also contributing to the downward move, Meger noted as well as a number of traders earlier today, were overnight comments about the IMF. French President Jacques Chirac said there must be a solution for the debt problem of poorer countries, "even if that means selling off a part of the IMF"s gold reserves." He made his remarks at the annual meeting of the Inter- American Development Bank in Paris. In addition, Germany"s finance ministry indicated it would also favor such a plan, provided it had the support of the country"s central bank, the Bundesbank. This is significant, Meger pointed out, because for a long time Germany either was "on the sidelines" or else had been a proponent of holding onto gold. Sources commented that the issue of IMF sales, as well as central bank sales, has been in the market for a long time. "But every time they rehash that, it seems to have some type of effect on this market," said Meger. Along with this, Meger pointed out that Friday"s COT data showed that the category which includes funds added to its net short position. He added that the events weighing on gold today came in the aftermath of a soft U.S. Producer Price Index report that came out Friday. Sources also noted stop-loss selling occurred as the gold market slid today. Meger put initial support for April gold at $286.50, then $285 and $282. Resistance was put at $290 and $291.50.