Commodities: Brent futures drop as US and China struggle to fix date for meeting
There was a 'risk-off' tone to trading in the commodities space at the start of the week.
Weighing on risk appetite, reports out after the close of trading in London said that US and Chinese officials were "struggling" to set a date for a face-to-face meeting in September after Washington rejected a request from Beijing to postpone the tariffs that were set to go into effect on 1 September.
US equity futures retreated in response, with the S&P 500 mini contract shedding 26.0 points to 2,898.75.
On Sunday, America had imposed a 15.0% US tariff on another $112.0bn-worth of Chinese exports, with Chinese levies on US exports being imposed simultaneously, although according to some observers China decided to go with slow with its own retaliatory tariffs.
Only one third of the items on Beijing's list of 5,000 products targeted for levies had been selected for tariffs of between 5.0% and 10.0% starting from 1 September.
Against that backdrop, front month Brent crude oil futures on the ICE lost 1.0% to $58.66 a barrel and RBOB gasoline futures for October delivery fell by 1.92% to $1.50 a gallon on NYMEX.
Precious metals futures headed in the opposite direction with December gold on COMEX adding 0.57% to $1,538.10/oz..
Three-month LME base metals futures were mixed albeit with copper ending the London session at $5,620 per metric tonne after opening at $5,657 per tonne.
"As the latest raft of US/China trade tariffs come into effect, 1st September, speculation will remain as to whether the combatants will get back round the table this month," said analysts at Sucden Financial.