* Gold posts 4 straight days of gains
* Up on technical buying, global flu pandemic fears
* Oil falls towards $50 on flu fears, Asian shares dip
(Updates prices)
By Lewa Pardomuan
SINGAPORE, April 27 (Reuters) - Gold jumped to its highest
in almost four weeks on Monday as fears of a global flu
pandemic prompted investors to seek safer assets.
Fears of a global swine flu pandemic grew with new
infections in the United States and Canada on Sunday, and
millions of Mexicans hid indoors to avoid a virus that has
killed 103 people. []
Oil <CLc1> dropped more than 2 percent towards $50 a barrel
while Asian stocks fell after the outbreak of swine flu
battered shares of airlines and transport firms. []
Precious metals tracked gold higher, other than platinum
which is seen as an industrial metal and was hit by worries
over the world economy should the flu outbreak spread and
become a pandemic.
Gold <XAU=> hit an intraday high of $918.25 an ounce, its
highest since April 2 on follow-through buying after China said
last week its gold reserves had risen. The metal later slipped
to $914.30, still $3.20 higher than New York's notional close.
"I am not too sure how the swine flu will play out. The
problem is the potential for this to explode to pandemic
proportions leaving a lot of people very very wary," said
Darren Heathcote of Investec Australia.
"It may well benefit gold as gold would be seen as a safe
haven," he said.
Gold, which has registered four straight sessions of gains,
has risen 5 percent over the past week and is 8 percent below
an 11-month high above $1,000 hit in February.
"It looks like we have moved out of the 2-month downtrend
and perhaps gold could head very much higher. The increase in
Chinese reserves did play a part and I guess the technical
traders will perhaps start coming in," said a dealer in
Singapore.
China revealed on Friday it had secretly raised its gold
reserves by three-quarters since 2003, confirming years of
speculation it had been buying. []
Dealers expected gold to face resistance around $932 -- an
intraday high seen in early April.
"Ultimately, we could well be targetting that mid $960s
again, which is that peak in the middle of March," said
Heathcote of Investec Australia.
The dollar index, a gauge of the greenback's performance
against six major currencies, climbed 0.4 percent to 85.099
<.DXY>. But the U.S. currency fell to a one-month low against
the yen. []
The world's largest gold-backed exchange-traded fund, the
SPDR Gold Trust <XAUEXT-NYS-TT>, said holdings remained
unchanged at 1,104.45 tonnes on April 26. []
The speculative long position in gold slipped to 128,367
contracts during the week to April 21 from, 129,895 during the
week to April 14. Precious metals prices at 0538 GMT
Metal Last Change Pct chg Day ago pct MA 30
RSI Spot gold $914.20 $3.10 +0.34% +1.92% $860.10
69
Spot silver $13.04 $0.20 +1.56% +8.85% $11.29
69
Spot plat $1173.00 -$0.50 -0.04% -0.04% $1156.63
52
COMEX gold $915.50 $1.90 +0.21% +1.03% $907.89
63
TOCOM gold 2,857 6 +0.21% +0.74% 2,884
57
TOCOM plat 3,664 -29 -0.79% -1.64% 3,666
43
Currencies
Euro/dlr $1.317 -$0.006 -0.48% -0.61%
Dlr/yen 96.70 -0.07 -0.07% -0.46%
(Additional reporting by Chikako Mogi in Tokyo, Editing by
Michael Urquhart)
