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Gold futures fell Monday, building on an April retreat that left the precious metal with its worst monthly performance since September.
Gold for June delivery
GC00,
GCM22,
fell $37.60, or 2%, to $1,874.10 an ounce on Comex. A surging U.S. dollar was blamed in part for a 2.1% April fall, the largest in seven months. May silver
SI00,
SIK22,
fell 46 cents, or 2%, to $22.625 an ounce.
“Gold was turned back from $1,920 before the weekend and appears poised to test last week’s low near $1,872,” said Marc Chandler, chief market strategist at Bannockburn Global Forex, in a note.
The ICE U.S. Dollar Index
DXY,
a measure of the currency against a basket of six major rivals, was up 0.4%, trading near highs last week that marked its strongest in more than seven years. A stronger dollar can be a weight on commodities priced in the unit, making them more expensive to users of other currencies.
Treasury yields, meanwhile, continued to rise, which raises the opportunity cost of holding assets that don’t offer a yield. Both the dollar and yields have been lifted by expectations the Federal Reserve will move aggressively in an attempt to rein in inflation running its hottest in more than four decades.
Fed policy makers will conclude a two-day meeting on Wednesday afternoon. Investors widely expect the central bank to raise the fed funds rate by 50 basis points, or half a percentage point, rather than deliver the typical quarter-point move. Investors have also been judging whether further outsize rate moves are likely in coming policy meetings.
Read: Fed’s half-percentage-point interest rate hike next week seen baked in the cake
In other metals trade, July copper
HGN22,
fell 2.6% to $4.294 a pound.
July platinum
PLN22,
lost 1.2% to trade at $928.80 an ounce, while June palladium
PAM22,
shed 2.3% to $2,253 an ounce.
