World gold prices are gloomy due to the long Lunar New Year holiday

Lunar New Year holiday and US employment figures will be the deciding factors for world gold prices next week.

After a trading session that caused gold prices to lose 2% per ounce on January 30, on January 31, the price of this precious metal increased slightly by nearly 3 USD (less than 1%) to 1,245.9 USD.

Thus, gold had a week of strong price changes, sometimes rising due to instability in some emerging economies but sometimes falling the most in a month.

Weak trading in China during the Lunar New Year holiday week will affect gold prices next week. Photo: ImagineChina.

Kitco’s weekly gold price survey asked 33 experts for their outlook for the coming week. Of the 21 respondents, half said gold prices would rise next week. Seven said prices could fall, while three said they would trade sideways.

Afshin Nabavi, head of trading at MKS (Switzerland), said it would not be surprising if gold prices remained in the trading range of last week. "Gold will have difficulty surpassing $1,275 an ounce, but I do not expect gold prices to fall below $1,225," he said. According to him, one of the main factors that will affect gold prices next week is the gloom in the Chinese market as the Lunar New Year holiday continues.

"The holiday lasts until Wednesday, but I don't expect Chinese investors to return to trading until next Monday," he said. Last week, gold trading began to slow on Thursday (January 29) as China and many other countries began their Lunar New Year holidays.

Without mentioning the forecast of the increase or decrease of gold prices, Afshin also said that next week will be an important week when the US announces the Non-Farm Payroll - an important indicator of the US labor market on Friday. In particular, the US Non-Farm Payroll in December was more disappointing than expected with the number of new jobs created less, making investors more hopeful about this January report. An expert at Nomura predicted that there could be 175,000 new jobs created and the unemployment rate will decrease by 0.1% to 6.6%./.

According to vov