MCX silver slips 2% to ₹2.58 lakh/kg, gold also declines as strong US jobs data curbs Fed rate cut bets

At 3:11 pm, the contract was trading 0.74% or ₹1,951 lower at ₹2,61,067 per kilogram. On Wednesday, the white metal future ended at ₹2,63,018 per kilogram, up by 4.15% on the MCX.

In the international market, COMEX silver (March expiry) fell as much as 3.33% to the day’s low of $81.125 per ounce. It had closed at $83.92 per troy ounce the day prior.

Similarly, gold futures for the April expiry dropped as much as ₹1,055 or 0.66% to an intraday low of ₹1,57,700 per 10 grams on the MCX.

At the time of writing, the yellow metal contract was trading 0.34% or ₹536 lower at ₹1,58,219 per 10 grams. It had ended at ₹1,58,755 per 10 grams, marking a 1.24% jump.

Globally, COMEX gold (April delivery) slumped as much as 0.66% to the session’s low of $5,065 per ounce. It had closed at $5,098.50 per ounce on Wednesday.

The precious metals fell as investors booked profits, as the latest US jobs data was above expectations, with the US economy adding 130,000 non-farm payrolls, much higher than the expectations of 70,000 and 49,000 in the previous month.

The unemployment rate also improved to 4.3%, compared to the expectations of 4.4%, trimming the bets on rate cuts.

Furthermore, US retail data, released on Wednesday, showed that consumer activity for December slowed down as retail sales remained flat, after a 0.6% increase in November.

According to the CME Group’s Fed Watch, while investors revised their bets downwards on the number of Federal Reserve rate cuts, most are still betting on at least two.

Meanwhile, the dollar index, which gauges the greenback's strength against a basket of six currencies, was trading 0.05% lower at 96.79.