Yingxi Yu Price Quotations

Short term price trends will continue to largely depend on gold.

We expect the market to remain in consolidation mood for now, though thin trading conditions ahead of the long holiday weekend could well spark big price movements.

Given the way the market has been trading over the past few days, we are very likely to see prices testing another 25-year high again this week.

Any price dip has been quite well supported by fund buying, and aggressive selling has been discouraged. The positive sentiment remains very strong and people are looking for further price gains.

We see some positive factors that could potentially bring prices near the top of this range.

We have not seen evidence of good physical demand at lower levels. Prices have been primarily driven by funds and, therefore, are vulnerable to sell-offs, should funds decide to exit the market.

This has the potential to push prices higher. Gold has always had a traditional role as an asset which holds its value in times of uncertainty.

A lot of investors are just buying because the price is going up, then trying to find reasons to explain it.

The strong price action and impressive technical trends in various currencies suggest prices should remain elevated in 2006.

The weaker (gold-dollar) correlation late last year and early this year was due to the overwhelming enthusiasm among the speculative community to drive prices higher.

Prices are being driven up by hedge funds, which are buying platinum because its fundamentals are looking good. Platinum has been in deficit for the past six years, and it's expected it will be in deficit this year.

We believe that the fund interest in silver is built upon a much narrower base of investors than gold, leaving it more vulnerable to big price moves in either direction.

I think the current environment is very supportive for gold. There is still a considerable amount of fund buying interests on price dips.

We will not rule out the possibility of further weakness and prices are likely to remain volatile in a broader range.

Price dynamics in gold next year will continue to be largely determined by speculative interest, backed by a myriad of justifications like inflationary risks, energy-price led economic slowdown, expectations of a US dollar correction, soaring physical demand, supply-side constraints, hopes of large scale central bank buying and so on.