Precious metals end 1% lower

Market was pressured by selling pressure and the surging U.S. dollar index

Bullion prices ended the U.S. day session down at Comex on Monday, 08 September 2014 and gold hit a three-month low on Monday. The market was pressured by selling pressure and the surging U.S. dollar index, which hit another 13-month high. Gold prices rolled over to close lower on Monday giving up earlier gains as headline risk from global conflicts eased.

Gold for December delivery closed at $1,254.30 an ounce, down 1% from $1,267.30 on Friday.

December silver fell 20 cents, or 1%, to settle at $18.96 an ounce.

Gold had ended Friday's session on a positive note, though it failed to hang on to much of the gains that were triggered from a soft jobs report earlier in the day. There was no major U.S. economic data released on Monday, which left gold and silver traders looking at outside markets for direction. The Nymex crude oil market slumped to a seven-month low on Monday, which was another outside-market negative for the gold and silver markets.

In other news Monday, China's trade surplus hit a record high in August, at $49.8 billion, and well above market expectations. China exports were reported up 9.2% in August, year-on-year, which is slightly better than expectations. Imports were down 2.4%. Falling raw commodity prices were a major contributor to China's trade surplus. China is the world's largest raw commodity importer.

Meantime, Japan's economy contracted by 7.1% in the second quarter, year-on-year, it was reported Monday. The past few years have seen Japan, which is still a top-five world economy, become less of a factor in world economic and markets matters.

On the geopolitical front, there were no major, markets-moving developments during the weekend.

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