Gold Heads for First Weekly Loss in Five on Crude Oil, Equities

By Feiwen Rong

July 18 (Bloomberg) -- Gold headed for its first weekly loss in five weeks as crude oil retreated from its record while U.S. equities rose for a second session yesterday, reducing demand for bullion as a haven asset.

Crude oil fell to below $130 a barrel yesterday for the first time since June 6 and traded at $129.97 at 9:55 a.m. in Singapore. The Dow Jones Industrial Average had its best two-day gain in almost six years, after better-than-expected earnings from JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Gold is ``influenced by the decline in oil prices and diminished safe-haven flows as U.S. equity markets recovered a notch,'' David Moore, commodity strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia in Sydney, said in a report today.

Bullion for immediate delivery was little changed at $957.97 an ounce, after trading in a range between $953.47 and $979.11 yesterday. Silver was little changed at $18.54 an ounce.

Gold was also under pressure as the euro headed for a weekly loss against the dollar as better-than-expected earnings from JPMorgan and Coca-Cola Co. eased concern the economic slowdown and credit-market turmoil will worsen. The European currency traded at $1.5835 at 9:55 a.m. in Singapore.

The dollar also rebounded from the lowest level in almost two months against the Japanese yen and traded at 106.32 yen the same time.

Gold for August delivery fell 1.3 percent to $958.10 an ounce in after-hours electronic trading on Comex.

Gold for June 2009 delivery was up 0.2 percent at 3,297 yen a gram ($964 ounce) on the Tokyo Commodity Exchange at 10:55 a.m. local time.

To contact the reporter for this story: Feiwen Rong in Singapore at frong2@bloomberg.net