Flat finish for yellow metal

Silver manages to end with good gains though

Gold prices saw a late upside push to finish almost unchanged on Monday, 02 February 2015 at Comex after trading weaker most of the session. Bullish outside markets on this daya weaker U.S. dollar index and higher crude oil priceshelped to give the gold and silver buyers the late advantage. Gold futures were flat on Monday after rallying to their biggest monthly gain in three years last week but the precious metal is poised to strengthen with U.S. stocks under pressure.

Gold for April delivery on Comex settled at $1,279.20 an ounce, unchanged from Friday.

March silver climbed 43 cents, or 2.6%, to $17.21 an ounce.

It's a busy week for U.S. economic data. Gold futures showed little reaction to December personal income and consumer spending figures released Monday morning. The yellow metal didn't react much to the Institute for Supply Management's manufacturing index, which slowed to a weaker-than-expected January reading of 53.5% from 55.1% in December.

The big event for the week comes on Friday, with the release of nonfarm payrolls and other labor data for January. Markey forecasts payrolls to show a rise of 245,000 versus a gain of 252,000 in December.

World markets were a bit quieter Monday. European stock markets were down on lingering worries about the European Union's debt negotiations with Greece, following last week's victory that put a leftist, anti-austerity prime minister in power. The data firm Markit reported the Euro zone purchasing managers index rose to 51.0 in January from 50.6 in December. A number below 50.0 suggests contraction.

In other weekend news, China's purchasing managers index declined for the first time in nearly three years. The official China PMI came in at 49.8 in January. The HSBC China manufacturing PMI was released Monday and came in at 49.7 in January versus 49.6 in December. The PMI data falls into the camp that reckons China's central bank will further ease its monetary policy at some point in the not-too-distant future.

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