Palladium futures tumbled to the lowest in more than three months amid signs of weakening investment and physical demand for the metal used in car pollution control devices.
Automobile and parts dealer sales fell 0.5 percent in August to C$10.9 billion (US$8.17 billion), leading the third straight decline in Canada’s retail sales, Statistics Canada said on Friday in Ottawa.
In the US, sub-prime borrowers are falling behind on their car loan payments at the highest rate in more than six years, S&P Global Ratings said earlier this month.
Palladium, used in gasoline engines, has slumped from a one-year high in August, in part as investors price in increasing probability that the US Federal Reserve might raise interest rates by the end of the year, curbing the investment appeal of non-interest bearing precious metals.
Money managers are getting more pessimistic about the outlook on palladium, cutting their net-long positions on palladium in seven of the past nine weeks.
“Demand is really starting to fall,” said Phil Streible, a senior market strategist at RJO Futures in Chicago.
“You’re going to see that as interest rates go up in the US, auto loan rates will rise and you’re probably going to see automobile sales decline,” he said.
Palladium futures for December delivery slipped 1.9 percent to settle at US$620.75 an ounce (28.3g) at 1:10pm on the New York Mercantile Exchange, after touching US$615.10, the lowest for a most-active contract since July 12.
Other precious metals:
Gold for December delivery on Friday gained less than 0.1 percent to US$1,267.70 an ounce on the Comex in New York.
The contract is up US$12.2, or 0.9 percent, from last week’s US$1,255.50.
Silver for December delivery settled at US$17.493 an ounce on Friday, up 0.3 percent from last week’s US$17.441.
Gold-backed exchange-traded funds expanded for a seventh session, taking assets to the highest in more than three years.
On the Nymex, platinum futures declined 0.3 percent.
Basic metals:
Copper futures had an eighth straight decline on Friday, the longest losing streak since 2014, amid persistent signs of oversupply in the market.
On the London Metal Exchange, copper for delivery in three months fell 0.4 percent to US$4,652 per tonne.
Nickel fell 0.8 percent to US$10,045 a tonne in London having earlier touched the lowest price in two weeks. The metal came under pressure after China’s top stainless steel producer said it plans to cut output.
Aluminum climbed for the first time in six days in London, trimming this week’s loss to 3.5 percent.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained