'One Way Gold' Up 1.4% to 18th New High of 2025 on Trump's Auto Tariffs 'Shock'
Thursday, 3/27/2025 16:43
GOLD BULLION jumped to new all-time highs against all major currencies in London's bullion market on Thursday as European stock markets slipped but equities in Asia and America rose following President Trump's sudden 25% trade tariff on the import of all foreign-made automobiles.
"Liberation Day in America is coming, soon," Trump tweeted on the TruthSocial platform he owns, apparently referring to next Wednesday, from when the new auto tariffs will apply.
London's 3pm benchmarking auction saw gold fix around $3056 per Troy ounce, up 1.4% for the day.
That marked gold's 18th fresh daily record in US Dollar terms since New Year, making 2025 the 10th best year already of the past 5.5 decades.
While New York's April Comex gold futures traded $10 above London's new benchmark-price high, a rush by speculators to keep rolling bullish bets forward saw June become the most-active contract, breaching $3100 for the first time.
With precious metals still not singled out for Trump's tariffs, that sharply widened the incentive – rather than an urgency – for traders to
ship yet more physical bullion into US warehouses.
"Tariff uncertainty stemming both from the US and other countries (Europe, Canada and Japan are considering reciprocal & retaliation tariffs) is ripe & amping up into April 2nd D-day," says Swiss bullion refining and finance group MKS Pamp's strategist Nicky Shiels.
"But the market has had weeks (months) to price this in...[and] we are going to get more certainty over tariffs [on 'Liberation Day' next week]. So assets that have been tariff sensitive (gold, DXY, US stocks, MEX, CAD) may see an unwind/'sell-the-event' kinda knee jerk reaction.
"For now it's a choppy & reactionary trading environment with few places to hide out. Hence the 1-way gold price action."
Shares in giant Japanese auto exporters Toyota (TYO: 7203) and Nissan (TYO: 7201) both meantime dropped almost 2.0%, while South Korea's Hyundai (KRX: 005380) lost 4.3%, and India's Tata Motors (NSE: TATAMOTORS) – owners of UK brand Jaguar Land Rover – sank 5.5%.
Germany's luxury-car makers Mercedes-Benz (ETR: MBG) and BMW (ETR: BMW) dropped over 2.0% each, and shares in VW (ETR: VOW3) – whose plant in Puebla, Mexico made 1/3rd of a million cars last year, all for export to the US – lost 1.3% to trade 1/10th below mid-March's 9-month high.
China's BYD in contrast (SHE: 002594) leapt another 2.8%, back towards last week's record highs, after
it reported sales out-running the electric-vehicle market's former leader Tesla across 2024.
Tesla itself (NASDAQ: TSLA) then rallied 4.1% in New York today, cutting its year-to-date plunge to a little over 25%.
New US data today revised growth in the world's largest economy higher for the last 3 months of 2024 to 2.4% annualized, thanks to inflation on the GDP prices index being revised down to 2.3%.
Inflation was also revised one tick lower on the more closely-followed core PCE index – set to show February's reading in new data Friday – at 2.6% per year in Q4.
Silver also jumped Thursday, gaining 2.3% from yesterday afternoon in London to put the more industrially-useful precious metal at 5-month highs of $34.40 per Troy ounce.
New York's silver futures traded 60 cents above that on the CME derivatives exchange's April Comex contract.
US copper prices edged back after ending Wednesday equal to $5.24 per pound on the CME's May contract – 14.3% above London's 3-month LME price of $10,112 per tonne – following Trump's threat to impose trade tariffs on the vital base metal, as he
already has on steel and aluminum.
Gold in UK Pounds today set a new London Fix record above £2360 per Troy ounce, up 1.1% on the day, while the Euro price jumped 1.4% to a new all-time benchmark high at €2832.
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