By Barani Krishnan
Investing.com - Gold prices tumbled on Thursday, hurtling back below the key bullish level of $1,900 an ounce after a dramatic improvement in U.S. weekly unemployment sent the dollar and bond yields surging at the expense of the yellow metal.
Gold for June delivery on New York’s Comex was down $37.15, or 2.%, at $1,872.75 an ounce by 10:15 AM ET (1415 GMT), after making a session low at $1,866.85.
It was the first major tumble below the $1,900 mark for Comex gold since May 25.
The spot price of gold, reflective of real-time trades in bullion, hit an intraday low of $1,865.49.
Traders and fund managers sometimes decide on the direction for gold by looking at the spot price — which reflects bullion for prompt delivery — instead of futures.
The Dollar Index, which pits the greenback against the euro and five other major currencies, hit a three-week high of 90.445.
Yields tied to the U.S. 10-year Treasury note rose 1.6% to 1.616.
Gold typically rises in a situation of economic uncertainty, although it can also appreciate on inflation pressure, which has been on the rise as well lately.
The dollar and yields jumped as the U.S. employment situation appeared to be progressing by leaps and bounds after being suppressed for more than a year by the coronavirus pandemic.
The weekly filing for jobless benefits in the United States fell by about 5% last week as some 385,000 people filed for unemployment claims, the lowest number since mid-March 2020, which marked the start of the pandemic, the Labor Department said Thursday.
The U.S. private sector, meanwhile, added 978,000 jobs in May, its most in nearly a year, as the economy continued to recover rapidly from the ravages of the coronavirus pandemic, data from private payrolls surveyor ADP (NASDAQ:ADP) showed on Thursday.
It was the largest private payrolls gain since the 4.35 million jobs added in June 2020.
The ADP number came just ahead of weekly unemployment claims numbers reported by the U.S. Labor Department, which will also issue on Friday jobs numbers for all of May.
Economists are conservatively expecting just about 655,000 job additions for May, according to a consensus tracked by Investing.com, after a disappointing expansion of just 266,000 in April. But some are anticipating a number closer to or higher than 1 million for May.
“People are going back to work as the economy continues the reopening process and wages adjust accordingly,” economist Greg Michalowski said in a commentary posted on ForexLive.