Gold, silver shares bounce despite further weakness in precious metals

In what marked one of the few encouraging signs for gold and silver shares in recent weeks, the sector recovered from earlier losses Thursday morning despite ongoing weakness in precious metals.

The Philadelphia Gold & Silver Index (XAU) initially fell as much as 1.4% to 173.96 – its lowest level since October 4th of this year – before bouncing back into positive territory, by 0.5% at 177.15.  Gold and silver shares in Canada posted gains as well, with the S&P/TSX Global Gold Index rising 0.3% to 351.68.

Among gold miners, Gold Fields (GFI) and Yamana Gold (AUY) were two of the sector’s best performers.  GFI advanced 0.8% to $15.18 per share and AUY rose 1.3% to $14.41 per share.

As for silver stocks, Pan American Silver (PAAS) climbed 1.2% to $20.64 per share and Silver Standard Resources (SSRI) jumped 1.7% to $12.94 per share.

COMEX gold futures, however, remained lower by $32.90, or 2.1%, at $1,531.20 per ounce while silver futures dropped $0.69, or 2.5%, to $26.55 per ounce.

The rebound in gold and silver shares coincided with a broad-based rally in U.S. equities after two better than expected economic reports.  The S&P 500 Index advanced 0.8% to 1,259.58 following encouraging data on the housing market and manufacturing sectors.

Pending home sales for November surged 7.3% on a month-over-month basis – far ahead of the 2.0% gain expected by economists.  Furthermore, the pending home sales index reached 100.1, its highest level since April 2010.  As for the December Chicago Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI), it came in at 62.5 – above the 60.1 consensus estimate among economists. – GoldAlert

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Posted by Silver Guru on Dec 29 2011. Filed under Silver stocks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry