Last Friday, gold for December delivery fell $8.40, or 0.6%, to settle at $1,314.60 an ounce on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange. Following a 3.2% surge in prices Thursday, prices settled with a 3.7% gain for the week.
December silver lost 3 cents, or 0.2%, to end at $21.91 an ounce. After climbing 2.7% on Thursday, the white metal tallied a gain of 3.1% for the week.
In current electronic trading, both gold and silver prices are firmly in the green territory.
In the coming week, gold will likely benefit from investors who are rethinking their views of the U.S. government and the dollar after another last-minute deal by Congress to fix a stalemate. Late Wednesday, U.S. Democrats and Republicans agreed to a temporary lift of the debt ceiling and to reopen the government.
A weak dollar, no tapering of quantitative easing by the Federal Reserve and lack of confidence in the U.S. after the three-week drawn-out budget and debt ceiling arguments produced nothing of substance other than the parties agree to fight again in January.
Gold is likely to spend part of next week consolidating its large gains from the past week and that could mean the market could set itself up for a rise, waiting for next technical signals.
In a report released Thursday, CPM Group said silver prices may rise to a record within the next 10 years as economic conditions improve. Futures prices, on a closing basis, reached a record near $49 an ounce back in 1980.
