Gold price on pace for longest skid in 7 weeks

New York (Aug 7)  Gold prices were tilting slightly lower on Monday, putting the precious metal on track to notch its longest streak of losses since mid June as U.S. stocks looked set to extend gains on the back of better-than-expected labor-market data.

December gold futures GCZ7, -0.02%  were off $2.30, or 0.2%, at $1,262.30 an ounce, with a four-session slump in sight. That run would mark the metal’s longest consecutive downturn since the five-session drop that ended June 13, according to FactSet data.

September silver SIU7, -0.26% meanwhile, lost 14 cents, or 0.8%, to trade at $16.115 an ounce. The white metal also was on track for a similar multisession slump as its sister metal.

Metals prices extended losses on Friday after a key employment report beat expectations. That prompted some traders to bet that the U.S. Federal Reserve would have few reasons to hold off on normalizing and raising interest rates, and reducing its $4.5 trillion balance sheet. Both moves can have the effect of tightening monetary policy, making metals, which don’t offer a yield, less attractive compared with yield-bearing assets, including 10-year Treasury notes TMUBMUSD10Y, -0.12%

The U.S. labor market added an impressive 209,000 new jobs in July, more than most economists were banking on, while the unemployment rate fell back to a 16-year low of 4.3%. The 10-year Treasury has been ticking higher in the wake of the report, most recently at 2.28%.
Meanwhile, base metals were rising, with Dalian iron-ore futures rising to a four-month high, while Shanghai steel rebar reached its highest levels in five years.

Resource metals enjoyed a bump on the back of speculation that China will order further production capacities to be shut down, according to a recent research note from Commerzbank.

In exchange-traded funds, the SPDR Gold Shares GLD, +0.00% was off 0.2%, mining-company focused VanEck Vectors Gold Miners ETF GDX, -0.07% was trading down 0.5%, while silver-oriented iShares Silver SLV, -0.26%  slipped 0.7%.

MarketWatch