Commodities: investors flock to gold, shun equities amid political uncertainty

Gold futures are in northbound focus Monday afternoon as investors flock to the yellow metal amid a politically motivated sell-off in equities.

At 15:26 GMT, on Comex, gold was up 0.62% to $1228.4 an ounce, while silver was up 0.75% to $17.61 a pound and copper rose 0.97% to 264.15 cents a pound.

Three-month industrial metals on London Metals Exchange were mostly lower, with a moderate rise in aluminum offset by a moderate slip in tin and bigger drops in copper and zinc.

London Capital Group senior market analyst Jasper Lawler noted gold's rise to an 11-week high, citing the equities sell-off.

"Adding credence to the gains in the price of gold was a simultaneous rise in the dollar index," said Lawler

"We remain tactically bullish gold with the central premise that the Federal Reserve will be slow to raise rates this year, constraining the dollar," he added.

The risk to this was that the next leg of the so-called 'Trump rally' reduced the desire for safe-haven assets, such as gold, but it was likely investors would still leave room for the yellow metal in their folios.

Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at CMC Markets UK, also noted gold's rise on political uncertainty.

These uncertainties, broadly speaking, included the US President Donald Trump and his platter of controversial executive orders, the fear of so-called hard Brexit for the UK, the euro zone economy, and US sanctions of Iran.

European Central Bank President Mario Draghi struck a particularly dovish tone today, said IG market analyst Joshua Mahony.

"His refusal to consider tightening monetary policy lead to a sharp move lower for the euro," Mahony added.

"The recent rise in Eurozone inflation had many wondering whether we would soon see an end to the ECB's expansionary stance, yet by disregarding inflation as largely energy driven, Draghi has essentially promised to maintain and even extend QE for a while yet."

Meantime, Nymex-priced West Texas Intermediate was down 0.22% to $53.71 a barrel, while Intercontinental Exchange-traded Brent was down 0.42% to $56.57 a barrel.

Hewson said the announcement of new US sanctions on Iran appear "don't appear to have given any significant juice to the oil price, as they remain below their recent highs.

"Another big rise in US rig counts from 712 to 729 last Friday appears to be helping cap the upside, with new buyers reluctant to dive in at such elevated levels."

Finally, among agriculturals, Chicago Board of trade-listed corn was up 0.21% to 366.0 cents a bushel, while wheat was down 0.35% to 428.75 cents a bushel.

ICE-quoted cocoa was down 1.45% to $2042 a MT, and cotton No.2 lost 0.24% to 76.23 cents a pound. Live cattle was up 0.69% to 116.43 cents a pound.