The international precious metals market saw active trading on December 17th, with gold and silver prices swinging upward. Spot gold successfully breached the $4,320 per ounce mark, while New York gold futures surged past $4,340 per ounce. Both investor safe-haven demand and inflation hedging needs jointly drove the strength in precious metal prices. In contrast, international oil prices extended their decline: the U.S. oil main contract fell 2.89% to $55.18 per barrel, and Brent crude’s main contract dropped 2.79% to $58.87 per barrel, creating a distinct “weak oil, strong gold” market pattern.
The rise in precious metal prices is supported by multiple favorable factors. On one hand, concerns about the U.S. economic outlook have intensified due to mixed non-farm payroll data and the slowdown in U.S. business activity growth in December to a six-month low, driving capital to flow into safe-haven assets such as gold. On the other hand, expectations of accommodative monetary policies among major global economies are growing. The Bank of Thailand is highly likely to cut interest rates by 25 basis points this week, and expectations for the Federal Reserve to maintain high interest rates have weakened, reducing the opportunity cost of holding precious metals. From a capital perspective, the holdings of the world’s largest gold ETF, SPDR Gold Trust, remained unchanged from the previous day, indicating that institutional demand for gold allocation remains stable.
Notably, silver prices experienced more volatile fluctuations. On December 17th, silver prices briefly surged past $64.658 per ounce to hit a record high during intraday trading, then fell back below $63 per ounce, with an intraday volatility of over 2.5%. This sharp fluctuation is closely related to the inflow and outflow of speculative capital. The holdings of the world’s largest silver ETF, iShares Silver Trust, decreased by 42.31 tons from the previous day, reflecting profit-taking by some short-term funds. Industry insiders stated that the future prices of precious metals will be mainly influenced by the Fed’s policy trends, global economic data, and geopolitical situations, and investors need to be vigilant against short-term volatility risks. For oil prices, attention should be paid to the subsequent production reduction measures by OPEC+ and the progress of global demand recovery.
