While platinum reached its highest level since September 2014 due to speculative buying, gold prices remained stable as investors watched the Israel-Iran confrontation. At 0955 GMT, spot gold remained stable at $3,369.79 an ounce. US gold futures dropped to $3,387.30, down 0.6%.
If the US chooses to get actively engaged in the war, ANZ Commodity Strategist Soni Kumari stated, “We’re not expecting that gold prices will fall back to 3,000 because there are a lot of uncertainties.”
As President Donald Trump left the world wondering if the US will assist Israel in airstrikes aimed at destroying Tehran’s nuclear infrastructure, Iranian rockets attacked an Israeli hospital on Thursday and Israel bombed sites throughout Iran.
The Fed kept interest rates unchanged on Wednesday, and although officials still expect to lower rates by half a percentage point this year, they have reduced their overall rate-cutting expectation in response to a more difficult economic outlook.
Fed Chair Jerome Powell, however, warned against placing too much emphasis on this prediction, pointing out that “meaningful” inflation is still to come since higher import duties are imminent. Gold is seen as a safe-haven asset in unstable economic and geopolitical times. Additionally, it usually does well in an economy with low interest rates. Platinum fell 2.5 percent to $1,288.67 in other metals, but earlier in the day it reached its best level since September 2014.
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