Trading Nation

It could get a lot worse for gold this week

Trading Nation: Gold gets worse
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Trading Nation: Gold gets worse
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With a slide of almost 7 percent in November, gold is wrapping up its biggest month of losses in more than two years. And according to some traders, a slew of negative catalysts are set to weigh even more on the commodity this week.

Driving gold's steep decline is the increased expectation of a rate hike at the Federal Reserve's next policy meeting, Phillip Streible of RJO Futures said Monday. Market watchers are also keeping a close eye on the November jobs report to be released Friday as another indicator of whether the U.S. central bank will move in December.

Also adding to the pressure on gold is the European Central Bank policy meeting scheduled for this week, Streible said, where it is expected to announce more monetary stimulus measures. All these events could drive the dollar higher, which would be a negative development for gold.

"Coming into November there was a lot of optimism about gold, it was up at $1,160. [But] over the course of the month that optimism really tarnished along with the price," Streible said Monday on CNBC's "Power Lunch." "I think the path of least resistance is down," he added.

Although gold ended October in the green, its gains were derailed by the strong jobs report for that month, which bolstered the outlook for a rate hike, he said. According to the CME's Fed Watch Tool, 78 percent of traders now expect a hike in December.

The last time gold had as big a drop as in November was in June 2013, when the yellow metal lost more than 12 percent in one month.

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Ari Wald of Oppenheimer said the technicals are also pointing to more losses ahead. Gold's 200-day moving average has been lagging despite some attempted rallies, Wald said, and resistance should come in at $1,100.

"Despite all this choppy behavior, that indicator has continued to move lower," Wald said Monday on "Power Lunch." "Based on the trend, we think it's going down. And for that reason we're still sellers here."

Wald sees gold ultimately falling back to the $1,000 level, another 6 percent drop from where the commodity traded on Monday. Gold briefly broke below $1,000 during trading earlier in the month.


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