Safe-haven bids, friendlier charts powering gold rally

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‘Everybody is growing the ounces, making all these deposits larger’ - Northern Superior CEO Simon Marcotte

‘We've got 100% control of a district-scale land package with an established resource of 3 million ounces’ - Maple Gold Mines’ Kiran Patankar

Nov 21 (Reuters) - Spot gold rose for a fourth consecutive session on Thursday, hitting an over one-week high as safe-haven demand soared following AI bellwether Nvidia's lackluster revenue forecast and intensifying Russia-Ukraine tensions.Spot gold was up 0.8% at $2,670.49 per ounce by 01:48 p.m. EST (1848 GMT), while U.S. gold futures settled 0.9% higher at $2,674.90. "It's really one main geopolitical factor that's at play here in the gold market over the course of the last several days - the increased tensions between Ukraine and Russia is probably most notable," said David Meger, director of metals trading at High Ridge Futures. Investors flock to safe-haven assets during global crises, and gold has soared to multiple record highs since the Middle East conflict erupted in October last year.With the United States vetoing a U.N. ceasefire resolution in Gaza and renewed Russia-Ukraine tensions, geopolitical risk premiums remain elevated, ensuring gold's enduring appeal.The move to the downside in equities after Nvidia's earnings has certainly supported precious metals from a safe-haven perspective, Meger added.Global stocks eased after AI bellwether Nvidia's revenue growth forecast failed to excite investors.Spot gold prices are up 4% so far this week, their best performance since April, recovering from last week's sharpest weekly drop in over three years. The decline in bullion was driven by a soaring dollar, boosted by "Trump Trade" euphoria."Bulls’ next upside (gold) price objective is to produce a close above solid resistance at $2,700.00," Jim Wyckoff, a senior market analyst at Kitco Metals, said in a note.Brokerages expect President-elect Trump's proposed tariffs to spur global market volatility and inflation, limiting central banks' ability to ease monetary policy.Meanwhile, a Reuters poll shows most economists anticipate a Federal Reserve rate cut in December, with smaller reductions projected for 2025.Investor focus is also on several Fed officials scheduled to speak this week. Expectations for a December rate cut have diminished notably, with the likelihood now at 56%, a sharp drop from 82.5% just a week earlier.Spot silver edged 0.1% lower to $30.85 per ounce, platinum gained 0.5% t0 $965.75 and palladium advanced 1.5% to $1,036.13.Reporting by Sherin Elizabeth Varghese in Bengaluru; Editing by Maju Samuel, Krishna Chandra Eluri and Mohammed Safi Shamsi

Gold climbs to over 1-week high on safe-haven demand

TORONTO, Nov 21 (Reuters) - The Canadian dollar edged up to a nine-day high against its U.S. counterpart on Thursday and bond yields climbed as a Canadian government proposal to increase spending reduced prospects for another outsized interest rate cut from the Bank of Canada.Canada's Liberal government, which is trailing badly in the polls ahead of next year's election, unveiled C$6.3 billion ($4.5 billion) in proposed new spending measures to help consumers deal with high prices. The measures could "translate into a noticeable boost to (gross domestic product) growth in the first half of next year," Royce Mendes, managing director and head of macro strategy at Desjardins, said in a note."The Bank of Canada will take this into account when considering how quickly and how far to cut rates. ... The announcement should all but close the door to a 50-basis-point cut next month."Investors see a roughly 10% chance the BoC will reduce its benchmark rate by half a percentage point at its next policy decision on Dec. 11, down from 38% before hotter-than-expected Canadian inflation data on Tuesday.The central bank eased by 50 basis points in October, the first cut of that magnitude in 15 years outside of the pandemic era.The Canadian dollar was trading 0.1% higher at 1.3960 per U.S. dollar, or 71.63 U.S. cents, after touching its strongest intraday level since Nov. 12 at 1.3928.The price of oil, one of Canada's major exports, rose 1.5% to $69.76 a barrel on rising Russia-Ukraine tensions, while the U.S. dollar (.DXY), opens new tab extended recent gains against a basket of major currencies as investors assessed the latest data on the American labor market.Canadian bond yields increased across the curve. The 10-year was up 5.8 basis points at 3.445%.Reporting by Fergal Smith; Editing by Leslie Adler

Canadian dollar rises as fiscal spending clips rate-cut bets

WASHINGTON, Nov 21 (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund will assess U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's tariff and tax-cut policies as details emerge, but it's "too early to speculate" on their potential impacts, IMF spokesperson Julie Kozack said on Thursday.Kozack told the first regular press briefing since Trump's Nov. 5 election victory that it was still "early days" for his economic plans to take shape. Trump takes office on Jan. 20. The Republican president-elect has vowed to impose tariffs of 60% on Chinese imports into the U.S. and duties of 10%-20% on goods from elsewhere. Trump also wants to extend expiring 2017 tax cuts and enact new tax breaks, which budget forecasters say could add new debt of $7.5 trillion over 10 years."The exact impact of any of these policies is very much going to depend on the details and that's why we will wait to see the details before we make our assessment," Kozack said.Worries among the IMF's 191-member economies about a return of Trump to power dominated the IMF and World Bank annual meetings in October. But IMF officials, including IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva, have been circumspect about the impact Trump's plans could have on the global economy and international financial institutions.Georgieva has long warned against rising trade barriers and growing geopolitical fragmentation of the global economy.On Tuesday, the director of the IMF's Asia and Pacific Department, Krishna Srinivasan, warned that tit-for-tat retaliatory tariffs threaten to disrupt growth prospects across the region. He did not mention Trump's tariff plans directly, but economists widely view the president-elect's tariff plans as likely to spark retaliation and raise costs.Reporting by David Lawder; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Paul Simao

IMF will not assess Trump's tariff, tax-cut plans until details emerge

Global Lithium will push back its annual shareholder meeting to February to allow time for the Australian government to review a potential breach by a shareholder of foreign acquisition laws.Global Lithium notified the markets of the court’s approval for it to delay the meeting by three months to Feb. 14 in an exchange filing on Tuesday and said it would provide more information on the matter soon.The deferral will give more time for the Treasury of the Australian government to consider a report that Global Lithium submitted to the agency on potential breaches of the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Act, the company said in the filing.(By Melanie Burton; Editing by Christian Schmollinger)

Global Lithium delays AGM on foreign interference concerns

Brazilian steelmaker Gerdau has signed a deal to buy out the stakes owned in Gerdau Summit by its joint venture partners Sumitomo Corporation and Japan Steel Works, it said on Thursday in a securities filing.According to Gerdau, it will buy a 39.53% slice owned by Sumitomo and a 1.74% stake from JSW, with a total cost of $32.6 million.The transaction is expected to close in early 2025, Gerdau said.(By Luana Maria Benedito; Editing by Jan Harvey)

Brazil’s Gerdau buys out Sumitomo Corp and JSW in Gerdau Summit

Russia will continue to buy diamonds through a state fund in 2025 in order to support the diamond industry and market, Deputy Finance Minister Alexei Moiseev said on Thursday.The Russian budget for 2025-2027 has set aside $1.55 billion for the purchase of precious metals and gems, Moiseev said in a statement.Russia will continue to ensure “stable global rough diamond prices in the wake of oversupply in the current market,” the same statement said.State-owned precious metals and gems repository Gokhran resumed buying diamonds from Alrosa in March 2024. Alrosa, under US and EU sanctions, is the world’s largest producer of rough diamonds by volume with 30% of the market.(By Anastasia Lyrchikova and Darya Korsunskaya; Editing by Andrew Osborn)

Russia to continue buying diamonds through state fund in 2025

Nov 21 (Reuters) - Chicago Federal Reserve President Austan Goolsbee on Thursday reiterated his support for further interest rate cuts and his openness to doing them more slowly, remarks that underscore the U.S. central bank's debate that it's not about whether, but over how fast and how far, borrowing costs should be lowered.Some Fed policymakers worry that progress lowering inflation may have stalled and call for a cautious approach, while others want to make sure the labor market doesn't cool further, suggesting the need for continued rate cuts. And over all of those differences hangs the uncertainty of how potential tariffs and tax cuts and an immigration crackdown promised by President-elect Donald Trump will affect prices, jobs, and the economy more broadly. Fed policymakers will meet on Dec. 17-18 to resolve their differences, at least temporarily, with a decision to either cut the policy rate again or wait to do so until next year. Financial markets judge it to be a close call, with interest rate futures putting about a 55% probability on a quarter-percentage-point cut, and a 45% chance of no cut.The Fed cut its policy rate by half a percentage point in September and by a quarter of a percentage point at its meeting earlier this month.Goolsbee, in remarks to the Central Indiana Corporate Partnership, did not say whether he favored another rate cut next month, but he did stake out a longer-term view that appears to be shared by most Fed policymakers - that rates are not yet where they need to be. The Chicago Fed president said inflation over the last year and a half has dropped and is on its way to the Fed's 2% goal, labor markets have cooled and the economy is now close to stable, full employment.It follows that interest rates should about a year from now be "a fair bit lower than where they are today," he said. The Fed's policy rate is currently set in the 4.50%-4.75% range.Fed policymakers projected in September that at the end of next year the policy rate should be anywhere from 2.9% to 4.1%. Since then, stronger-than-expected inflation readings and big swings in monthly job market data may have shifted those views somewhat, with the central bank due to publish new forecasts at its meeting next month.Given the uncertainty and disagreement over how much lower rates ought to go, Goolsbee said "it may make sense to slow the pace of rate cuts as we get close." Reporting by Ann Saphir; Editing by Paul Simao

Fed's Goolsbee says pace of rate cuts may need to slow

WASHINGTON, Nov 21 (Reuters) - The number of Americans filing new applications for unemployment benefits fell to a seven-month low last week, suggesting that job growth likely rebounded in November after abruptly slowing last month amid hurricanes and strikes.It is, however, taking longer for laid-off workers to find new jobs, posing an upside risk to the unemployment rate. The report from the Labor Department on Thursday also showed unemployment rolls swelling to levels last seen in late 2021. Labor market slack keeps the door open to a third interest rate cut from the Federal Reserve next month, despite a recent lack of progress lowering inflation to its 2% target."There is little evidence of large layoffs taking place," said Gisela Hoxha, an economist at Citigroup. "However, in a low hiring environment those individuals that are laid off are finding it harder to get a new job and are remaining on unemployment benefits for longer, which implies upside risk to the unemployment rate."Initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped 6,000 to a seasonally adjusted 213,000 for the week ended Nov. 16, the lowest reading since April. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast 220,000 claims for the latest week.The data included the Veterans Day holiday, which could have injected some volatility.Unadjusted claims decreased 17,750 to 213,035 last week. Filings in California dropped 4,657, almost reversing the prior week's 5,906 jump. The state offered no comment for that increase. There were also notable declines in applications in New Jersey, Ohio, Georgia, Texas and Indiana.Filings had surged in New Jersey and Texas in the prior week, blamed on layoffs in the educational services industry as well as the healthcare and social assistance sector.Though overall claims soared in early October amid disruptions caused by Hurricanes Helene and Milton as well as strikes by factory workers at Boeing (BA.N), opens new tab and another aerospace company, layoffs have remained low. That is softening the hit on the labor market from sluggish hiring.The claims data covered the period during which the government surveyed businesses for the nonfarm payrolls component of November's employment report. Claims dropped by 29,000 between the October and November payrolls survey weeks.Stocks on Wall Street traded higher. The dollar was steady against a basket of currencies. U.S. Treasury yields were little changed. JOB GROWTH REBOUND EYEDGovernment data on Tuesday confirmed that Helene, Milton and the aerospace strikes had accounted for much of the sharp slowdown in job growth in October.The state employment and unemployment report also showed the labor market steadily slowing. Economists estimated the strikes and storms probably subtracted between 100,000 and 125,000 jobs from payrolls last month.Nonfarm payrolls increased by a scant 12,000 jobs in October, the fewest since December 2020, after rising by 223,000 in September. The Boeing strike ended early this month after workers accepted a new contract, while rebuilding is underway in the areas devastated by the hurricanes, creating a base of at least 100,000 jobs for November's payrolls.Data next week on unemployment rolls could offer more clarity on the state of the labor market in November.The number of people receiving benefits after an initial week of aid, a proxy for hiring, increased 36,000 to a seasonally adjusted 1.908 million during the week ending Nov. 9, the claims report showed. The unadjusted so-called continuing claims increased 21,782 to 1.669 million. There was a sharp rise in Washington state, likely a residual from furloughs initiated by Boeing during the seven-week strike.Continuing claims also rose substantially in Michigan, probably because of layoffs in the automobile industry. Economists dismissed a 15,357 plunge in Georgia as a fluke.Some argued that the gap between the adjusted and unadjusted continuing claims suggested the latest rise was probably due to difficulties ironing out seasonal fluctuations from the data."Continuing claims have trended higher, which may suggest some slowing in re-hiring," said Conrad DeQuadros, senior economic advisor at Brean Capital. "But this could also be the product of inadequate seasonal adjustment factors."The employment report for November could determine if the Fed cuts rates again in December. The U.S. central bank trimmed rates by 25 basis points earlier this month, lowering its benchmark overnight interest rate to the 4.50%-4.75% range.The Fed embarked on its policy easing cycle with an unusually large half-percentage-point rate cut in September, its first reduction in borrowing costs since 2020. It hiked rates by 525 basis points in 2022 and 2023 to curb a surge in inflation.There was a temporary respite for the housing market, which has borne the brunt of aggressive policy tightening.Home sales jumped 3.4% in October to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 3.96 million units after slumping to a 14-year low in September, the National Association of Realtors said in a separate report. Economists had forecast home resales rebounding to a rate of 3.93 million units. Sales increased 2.9% year-on-year, the first annual gain since July 2021. October's homes sales likely reflected contracts signed in August and September, when mortgage rates were declining in anticipation of the Fed loosening policy.Mortgage rates have erased all the decline since August as U.S. Treasury yields have risen on strong economic data and investor fears that President-elect Donald Trump's policies, including higher tariffs on imported goods and mass deportations, could reignite inflation.Housing inventory stood at 1.37 million units in October, up 19.1% from one year ago. Despite the rise in supply, the median existing home price rose 4.0% from a year earlier to $407,200, the highest for any October.At October's sales pace, it would take 4.2 months to exhaust the current inventory of existing homes, up from 3.6 months a year ago. A four-to-seven-month supply is viewed as a healthy balance between supply and demand."The renewed rise in mortgage rates through mid-November suggests that sales should remain sluggish through year-end even with availability perking up in many areas," said Ben Ayers, senior economist at Nationwide. Reporting by Lucia Mutikani; Editing by Paul Simao, Chizu Nomiyama and Andrea Ricci

US weekly jobless claims at seven-month low; home resales rebound in October

WASHINGTON, Nov 21 (Reuters) - U.S. mortgage rates increased to a four-month high this week, which together with higher home prices could sideline potential buyers from the housing market in the near term.The average rate on the popular 30-year fixed-rate mortgage increased to 6.84%, the highest level since July, from 6.785% last week, mortgage finance agency Freddie Mac said on Thursday. It averaged 7.29% during the same period a year ago. Though the Federal Reserve has cut interest rates twice since September, U.S. Treasury yields have risen on strong economic data and investor fears that President-elect Donald Trump's policies, including higher tariffs on imported goods and mass deportations, could reignite inflation.Mortgage rates track the 10-year Treasury note. Reporting By Lucia Mutikani

US 30-year fixed-rate mortgage approaches 7%

NEW YORK, Nov 21 (Reuters) - New data from the New York Federal Reserve suggests the U.S. central bank isn't facing any roadblocks to continuing forward with its ongoing effort to shrink the size of its balance sheet.The regional Fed bank reported on Thursday that its Reserve Demand Elasticity Measure 50th percentile reading, opens new tab stood at -0.15 on Nov. 13, holding steady relative to where it was a month ago. The New York Fed said as part of its report that "reserves remain abundant." The New York Fed index tracks market liquidity conditions. Launched publicly a month ago, it is designed to show how flush or tight bank reserves are. Numbers veering into negative territory can suggest mounting bank reserve tightness, which speaks directly to what the Fed is doing with its ongoing effort to reduce its bond holdings via a process known as quantitative tightening, or QT.For just over two years the Fed has been shedding its holdings of bonds to normalize the size of its balance sheet. That's taken its overall balance sheet from about $9 trillion in the summer of 2022 to the current level of about $7 trillion.The Fed is aiming to take out as much liquidity as it can to allow the federal funds rate, its chief tool for achieving its monetary policy goals, to trade at the desired level and to allow for normal money market volatility. The challenge for the central bank and for private economists is that it is not clear how far it can go with liquidity removal before it runs into turbulence.The New York Fed measure suggests the process faces no imminent need to stop, which jibes with recent comments from central bank officials and market expectations, which currently eye an end to QT at some point next year.The New York Fed measure tends to front-run periods of tight reserves by a good margin, which suggests that increasingly negative readings could be a clear sign the Fed needs to shift gears on QT.The index began to lose ground in October 2017 when the Fed last shrank its holdings and bottomed in October 2019, just after the central bank faced an unexpected liquidity shortfall that forced it to aggressively add liquidity to money markets to regain firm control of the federal funds rate.Reporting by Michael S. Derby; Editing by Paul Simao

New York Fed says bank reserves abundant as of mid-November

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