(Reuters) - DowDuPont Inc (DWDP.N) reported a higher-than-expected first-quarter profit on Thursday as increased prices for its products and demand for packaging, paint and other materials made up for a weak agriculture business.The chemical producer, formed by the merger of Dow Chemical and DuPont last year, clocked up net sales of $21.5 billion for the quarter, which the company said compared to...Read More

The U.S. trade deficit narrowed sharply in March as exports increased to a record high amid a surge in deliveries of commercial aircraft and soybeans.The Commerce Department said on Thursday the trade gap dropped 15.2 percent to $49.0 billion, the lowest level since September. Data for February was revised slightly to show the trade gap widening to $57.7 billion, which was the highest level since...Read More

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Europe’s economic slowdown came sooner than expected and factors holding back growth may persist in the near term but the European Central Bank is still making “substantial” progress in lifting inflation, ECB Chief Economist Peter Praet said.Downplaying the impact of weak data, Praet said growth remains solid, the slowdown may be due to exceptional factors,...Read More

* Euro zone inflation unexpectedly slips in April* German, French 10-year yields at 2-week lows* Euro zone periphery govt bond yields tmsnrt.rs/2ii2Bqr (Writes through)By Fanny Potkin and Dhara RanasingheLONDON, May 3 (Reuters) - Euro zone government bond yields hit two-week lows on Thursday after April inflation in the single currency bloc unexpectedly slowed, a headache for the European Centra...Read More

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Ducking analysts’ questions has a price: $2 billion.Tesla Inc investors gave a rare rebuke to iconoclastic Chief Executive Elon Musk on Wednesday after he cut off analysts asking about profit potential, sending shares down 5 percent despite promises that production of the troubled Model 3 electric car was on track.Tesla’s future depends on the Model 3 and the...Read More

Chris Eger will step down from his role as chief financial officer with miner and metals supplier Nyrstar in the summer, the company said on Thursday May 3.Eger has been at Nyrstar for two-and-a-half years since joining the company from Trafigura."Chris has communicated to the board over recent months that he has decided to...Read More

Bradley Levitan and William Copp have left London Metal Exchange category I member INTL FCStone, sources said. Copp has joined rival trading firm ED&F Man Capital Markets, according to his LinkedIn page, with sources saying Levitan will also join him...Read More

Drilling at the un-mined Southwark deposit has been completed, for a total of 3,200m. Approximately 1,300 assayed metres are included in this announcement. The concluding stage of the RC drilling program is currently underway at the Emu deposit, ahead of resource modelling. This phase of RC drilling at Bottle Creek will be completed on the 7th May, 2018; well ahead of schedule and within budget. A...Read More

Base metals on the London Metal Exchange were mostly lower at the close of trading on Thursday May 3, with zinc breaking below $3,000 per tonne and diving to its lowest point since August 2017. Zinc kept steady early in the day but took a 1.3% drop prior to the close after spending much of the week consolidating around the $3,050-$3,100-per-tonne mark.A delivery of more than 60,000 tonnes was ship...Read More

Bradley Levitan and William Copp have left London Metal Exchange category I member INTL FCStone, sources said. Copp has joined rival trading firm ED&F Man Capital Markets, according to his LinkedIn page, with sources saying Levitan will also join him...Read More

Comex copper prices were spurred higher during the morning session on Thursday May 3 after the US Federal Reserve decided to maintain the Fed Funds rate, pressuring the dollar lower. Copper for July settlement on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange gained 2.35 cents or 0.8% to $3.0920 per oz. "The blip higher in the LME copper price this morning is encouraging though buyers need...Read More

Time cycles and the timing of fed increases point to a low in the June time frame.We have seen sell-offs into these time cycle lows.The $1,305 price range and 200-day moving averages will be important for bulls to hold in the weeks ahead.In February, I published a Seeking Alpha article that suggested gold would establish a major low in the May-June time frame. This still looks like a distinct poss...Read More

Forget about predicting what will happen in a stock market downturn. Short-seller Chris Irons, founder of Quoth the Raven Research, said it's time to consider shorting the whole American economic and free market system. For Irons, gold is the best bet for long-term. "If you don't want to take it from me, take it from the central government," Irons said at a Kase Learning short-selling event in N...Read More

For the last four months, gold had decoupled from its usual correlation with TIP and with longer-run Treasury yields.Now that the dollar has broken out of its downward spiral, gold is once again correlating normally with all four of the big markets.If gold closes below $1300 and the dollar continues to rally, there is little to keep it from falling into the $1250-$1240 zone.In the past--before Dec...Read More

This item is part of Stockwatch's value added news feed and is only available to Stockwatch subscribers.Here is a sample of this item:by Will PurcellThe diamond and specialty minerals stocks box score for Thursday was a ho-hum 70-80-144. The TSX Venture Exchange fell fractionally to 771 while polished diamond prices fell 0.2 per cent. Hugh Stoyell and Johnny Blizzard's Katanga Mining Ltd. (KAT), w...Read More

This item is part of Stockwatch's value added news feed and is only available to Stockwatch subscribers.Here is a sample of this item:by Stockwatch Business Reporter West Texas Intermediate crude for June delivery gained 50 cents to $68.43 on the New York Merc, while Brent for June gained 26 cents to $73.62 (all figures in this para U.S.). Western Canadian Select traded at a discount of $17.55 to...Read More

   •  The post-FOMC USD retracement prompts short-covering move.   •  Sliding US bond yields/reviving safe-haven demand supportive.    •  Technical buying above $1313 provides an additional boost. Gold built on its recovery move from the very important 200-day SMA and spiked to fresh multi-day tops in the last minute. The post-FOMC U...Read More

This item is part of Stockwatch's value added news feed and is only available to Stockwatch subscribers.Here is a sample of this item:by Stockwatch Business ReporterNew York spot gold rose $7.00 to $1,311.60 on Thursday. The TSX Venture Exchange fell 0.86 point to 771.25 while the TSX Gold Index added 1.66 points to 191.50. Detour Gold Corp. (DGC), which had a rough time last week, dropping over $...Read More

Overall global gold demand fell to its lowest first-quarter level since 2008, driven by a slump in demand for gold bars and exchange-traded funds backed by the precious metal, according to a report from the World Gold Council released Thursday. Total gold investment demand fell to 973 metric tons in the first quarter, down 7% from 1,047 metric tons in the first quarter of 2017, the WGC reported....Read More

This item is part of Stockwatch's value added news feed and is only available to Stockwatch subscribers.Here is a sample of this item:by Stockwatch Business ReporterThe TSX Venture Exchange fell a fraction to 771.25 Thursday. Peter McKeown has listed his first capital pool shell, MG Capital Corp. (MGX), following a $250,000 initial public offering at 10 cents through Leede Jones Gable Inc. It has...Read More