ALAN FINLAY, Johannesburg | Tuesday 5.50pm.
THE volatile gold price broke the $324 critical resistance level early Tuesday, boosting the gold board which left all other indices in its wake to close 3,85% or 47,82 points in the black.
The yellow metal spent the day trading in an $8,00 band. At 5.30pm it had lost most of its ground and was trading at $318,55 to the ounce.
One analyst attributed the surge to behind-the-scenes power playing by big hedge funds. Dealers earlier anticipated the gold price could catapult to as high as $385 an ounce by the end of November, if can push through the $324 mark. De Beers and Anglo American posted the most active shares by value on the day.
Platinum followed gold’s surge and was trading $433,00 to the ounce at 5.30pm.
The JSE all share index ended 0,31% or 23,32 points in the red, with financials slipping 0,73% or 67,89 points and industrials closing play 0,50% or 37,86 points down.
“Financials are due for a technical rebound,” said Standard and Poor’s Ray Brand. “The fact that the Dow Jones retraced most of its gains on Monday and opened lower most of today didn’t help,” he said. The heavyweight Alsi-40 also stripped some of Monday’s gains to end 0,81% or 55,67 points down.
Analysts are bullish about the public offer for shares in Discovery Health, a high growth health insurance company, which closes Friday. It is anticipated to be the largest listing this year after the two mutual funds and one of the largest ever on the JSE. The company will list with a projected market capitalisation of R2,6-billion.
Tokyo’s Nikkei closed play 0,16% in the black, while the Hang-Seng lost 1,80%. At 5.30pm New York’s Dow Jones was 1,12% or 119,68 points in the red.