Commodities markets summary
Market watch top headlines
Australian reports
- Aust markets: Aust stocks close higher
- Aust dollar report: $A higher but trading in narrow range
- Aust credit close: Aust bonds weaker after more good US data
World reports
- World commodities: Commodities markets summary
- World markets: International markets roundup
AAP
2012-08-03
A summary of trading in key commodities markets overseas:
ENERGY
Oil prices fell after the European Central Bank (ECB) announced no immediate action on the eurozone sovereign debt crisis, disappointing investors.
New York's main contract, light sweet crude for September, on Thursday finished at $US87.13 a barrel, down $US1.78 from Wednesday's closing level.
Brent North Sea crude for delivery in September slipped six US cents to $US105.90 a barrel in London trade.
ECB president Mario Draghi, after a one-day monetary policy meeting Thursday, revealed no concrete measures to ease debt pressures in the eurozone.
PRECIOUS METALS
Gold futures have fallen on disappointment that the European Central Bank (ECB) kept its monetary policy unchanged at a closely watched meeting.
The most actively traded contract, for December delivery, on Thursday fell $US16.60, or one per cent, to settle at $US1,590.70 per troy ounce on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange.
The ECB dashed hopes of new easy money measures from the central bank, with the governing committee opting to leave interest rates unchanged and announcing no new stimulus measures.
Silver lost 54 US cents to close at $US26.995.
BASE METALS
Base metals have closed lower on the London Metal Exchange (LME) dropping as investors expressed their disappointment with European Central Bank (ECB) president Mario Draghi's failure to signal imminent stimulus measures at a monthly news conference.
At the PM kerb close on Thursday, LME three-month copper was down 1.2 per cent at $US7,330 a metric ton. Nickel was down 1.9 per cent at $US15,250.
Expectations for further ECB stimulus had risen since last week, following comments from the central bank's president saying he would do "whatever it takes" to preserve the euro.
After announcing the ECB had decided to hold the central bank's main refinancing interest rate steady at 0.75 per cent, Draghi's reiteration that the ECB may undertake "open market operations," buoyed metals temporarily.
But when he did not give more detail or a likely timescale for this, market participants turned negative, keeping base metals under pressure.
