Gold Posts Biggest Gain Since 2016 on Equities Rout, Fear Factor

© Reuters. Gold in biggest one-day percentage gain since June 2016.

Investing.com - Gold jumped about 3% on Thursday, its biggest one-day gain in more than two years, as tumbling stock markets on fears over rising bond yields and rates drove investors toward safe havens.

Slowing global growth and trade tensions also helped return the yellow metal return to above $1,200 an ounce, a perch that has become a gold standard in itself for bullion in recent weeks, proving its standing as a strong hedge to fiat currencies.

“Gold is finding some solid support, especially given that the stock markets are selling off,” said Fawad Razaqzada, technical analyst at forex.com.

He said Donald Trump’s branding of the Federal Reserve’s hawkish monetary policy as "mistake" and its path of rate hikes as "crazy” was further scaring investors off the dollar and towards gold.

“The next potential resistance is $1,238,” Razaqzada said.

December gold futures settled up $34.20, or 2.9%, at $1,227.60 on the COMEX division of the New York Mercantile Exchange. It was the largest daily percentage gain since June 24, 2016, Investing.com data showed. The high for the day was $1,229.90, less than $10 from the resistance cited by Razaqzada.

Gold received an additional boost from the broadly weaker dollar, with the U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback’s strength against a basket of six major currencies, down 0.54% at a one-and-a-half week low of 94.71 by 2:56 PM ET (1856 GMT).

Expectations for rising interest rates look likely to remain a headwind for gold prices. Interest rate increases and higher U.S. bond yields dampen appeal for gold, which offers no yield. They also tend to boost the dollar.

Elsewhere in COMEX precious metals trading, December silver advanced 1.7% to $14.57 a troy ounce, while January platinum was trading at $843.70, up 2% on the day.

Among base metals, COMEX December copper was down 0.7% to trade at $2.76 per pound.