By Myra P. Saefong www.CBS.MarketWatch.com September 14, 2001 NEW YORK -- December gold prices jumped as high as $300 an ounce in Access trading at the New York Mercantile Exchanged Friday, following a more than $4 an ounce climb in spot gold prices. Traders bought into the commodity as a hedge against the uncertainty over the economic effects of Tuesday's terrorist attacks in the U.S. December gold jumped by as much as $20 to $300 an ounce at the start of Access trading, and ended the session at $292.70, up $12.70. The Commodities Exchange division of the Nymex remained closed for regular trading Friday, but Nymex Internet-based Access trading opened at 2:30 p.m. Eastern time for major futures contracts trading. "Technical difficulties" forced the New York Mercantile Exchange to suspend trading for an hour shortly after the open, but the exchange extended Access trading to 6 p.m. to make up for it. Spot gold closed at $285.25 an ounce, up $5.50 Friday. The London p.m. gold fix was at $285.75. December silver also climbed by 11.5 cents to $4.34 an ounce in Access trading. Adding to support Friday was confirmation that about 12 tons of gold, worth roughly $106 million, are buried in the debris pile from New York City's devastated World Trade Center. The gold bars were stored in an underground warehouse near the Twin Towers and held on behalf of Comex. Jonathan Potts, managing director at FideliTrade Inc., co-parent of the Delaware Depository Services along with AT Systems, said there's no way of knowing when the gold will be dug out of the rubble. However, Alaron.com senior metals analyst David Meger noted that the "amount of physical gold should not be an issue" because banks can borrow gold for delivery. Any moves higher are likely "done on short covering and speculative buying in light of recent events," he said. Meger won't rule out a "chance for a squeeze, but once again that would more than likely be created by other factors than the buried gold and silver," he said, as the metal is not destroyed but simply inaccessible for a while. John Mesrobian, president of Constantinople Advisors in Williamsburg, Va., argued that there is actually very little real physical gold around to borrow and that bullion banks are "in trouble," because they can't deliver and warehouse stocks were low to begin with. In other metals news, spot silver added 5 cents to $4.26 an ounce, and spot platinum tacked on $19 to $470 an ounce. Major metals stocks on the Toronto Stock Exchange closed sharply higher Friday, following declines a day earlier. Shares of Placer Dome Gold added 79 cents to close at $19.19, after falling on Thursday. Glamis Gold gained 95 cents to $6.20, and Franco Nevada Mining climbed by 94 cents to settle at $21.65. ------------------------------ Myra P. Saefong is a reporter for CBS.MarketWatch.com in San Francisco. -END- ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> <FONT COLOR="#000099">Get your FREE credit report with a FREE CreditCheck Monitoring Service trial </FONT><A HREF="http://us.click.yahoo.com/MDsVHB/bQ8CAA/ySSFAA/WfTolB/TM";><B>Click Here!</B></A> ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
