The price of gold increased on Monday morning amid news about the worsening epidemiological situation for the spread of coronavirus infection in the world.
The price of gold futures contracts for February delivery on the electronic trading platform in New York climbed 0.19% or $3.75. Thus, its current level has moved to the level of $1,843.75 per troy ounce.
The price of the silver futures contract for March delivery, on the contrary, slightly decreased by 0.05% to $24.24 per troy ounce.
The coronavirus pandemic continues its march around the world and further strengthens. In this regard, all the hype around the development of a vaccine against COVID-19 was almost leveled. Investors lost their optimism about the possibility of widespread vaccination as soon as possible. A sober view of the events took up. It indicates, first of all, that the drug will not demonstrate its effect soon, which means that there is still a rather long and unpredictable fight against coronavirus infection. Of course, in this situation, many market participants will again turn their attention to the protective asset sector, which traditionally includes precious metals. For gold, once again, great times are coming, and rapid growth is almost inevitable.
Recall that in the United States of America, a significant increase in the number of coronavirus infections is recorded. Over the past few days, the daily increase is more than 200,000 new cases. And last Saturday, another negative record was recorded as cases increased by 227,000. Against this background, quarantine measures have again begun to tighten in certain states where the epidemiological situation is particularly severe. Los Angeles authorities already issued mandatory home isolation. It is clear that such measures do not add any optimism to market participants and further push them into the safe haven of gold.
Among other things, the precious metals market is feeling quite significant support from the growing geopolitical tension. We are talking about the deterioration of relations between the United States of America and China. As it became known, the American authorities are seriously considering the possibility of introducing another portion of sanctions against more than ten Chinese officials. Moreover, some of these officials represent China's Ministry of Defense. The conflict between the countries supported the metals market well in the spring of this year. A repetition of the situation, according to most analysts, should be expected at present.
In addition, it should be noted that investment demand for gold in the near future will continue to recover at an even faster pace than it was previously. This is evidenced by statistics on economic growth in India and China, which are traditionally the largest consumers of physical gold.