Precious metals see small price gains

In the metals markets on Friday gold was as high as $636.50 per troy ounce after comments from China that it is looking to diversify its foreign exchange reserves.  By late afternoon in London, however, the price of gold had fallen to $628.80 for a gain of only 0.1 percent on the week.  Meanwhile, platinum added 0.4 percent over the week to $1,227 per troy ounce on talk that an exchanged traded fund might be introduced.

In base metals, lead was a bit weaker this week, ending at $1,675 per tonne after going to a new record high price of $1,750 earlier on Friday.  Zinc was slightly higher on the week as it fell to $4,300 per tonne after also finding a new record, $4,580 per tonne, early in the day on Friday.  Inventories of zinc dropped to 95,200 tonnes in London Metal Exchange warehouses.  Nickel saw big declines over the week, ending at $29,400 per tonne, a decline of 6.4 percent on the week.