Gold exchange traded funds continued their slide Wednesday and look to be testing the 200-day moving average, a key technical indicator the precious metal ETFs haven’t breached since early 2009.
Gold prices fell Tuesday after the Federal Reserve didn’t hint it would initiate more quantitative easing as some had speculated. The metal has also been hit by European liquidity fears as nervous investors move into dollars.
Gold has underperformed the S&P 500 since Aug. 4, increasing 0.65% compared to the 2.5% rise in the S&P 500, writes Mark Gongloff for WSJ.com’s MarketBeat. Both the equities and gold markets have been falling together during the rough times, but gold has shown greater declines.
Speculators jumped onto the gold train earlier this year, betting on the negative impact of loose monetary policies many central banks took on and the eventual surge in inflation. However, the higher margin requirements, along with more individuals and central banks dumping precious metals to raise cash, have all attributed to the weakness in the gold market, according to the report.
Technical analysis suggests gold could experience another round of sell-offs, Michael Shaoul, CEO of Oscar Gruss, wrote in a research note Monday.
“Gold traded through its 150 day ($1,667 an ounce) and hit a low of $1,663 this morning but has subsequently bounced up to $1,669,” Shaoul said in the MarketBeat story. “Given that this support has been in place for almost three years we would build a margin of error of at least 2% into a breach, meaning that it would take a close below $1,630 to signal a definitive breakdown. We would mark ‘last ditch’ support at $1,600 where gold bounced repeatedly in September and October.”
As of Tuesday’s close, the 200-day exponential moving average for gold was $1,619.55 an ounce. Gold prices fell by $50 an ounce to drop below that level in morning trade Wednesday.
Gold ETFs include:
- SPDR Gold Shares (NYSEArca: GLD): down 8.31% over the past three months.
- iShares COMEX Gold Trust ETF (NYSEArca: IAU): down 8.24% over the past three months.
- ETFS Physical Swiss Gold Shares ETF (NYSEArca: SGOL): down 8.29% over the past three months.
- Powershares DB Gold Fund ETF (NYSEArca: DGL): down 8.44% over the past three months.
- ETFS Physical Asian Gold Shares ETF (NYSEArca: AGOL): down 9.81% over the past three months.
SPDR Gold Shares
For more information on gold, visit our gold category.
Max Chen contributed to this article.
Full disclosure: Tom Lydon’s clients own GLD.