Gold now stands at Rs457,236 a tola, up Rs7,900 (Pakistan Observer).
Bullion
| | Change | Level | |—|—|—| | Gold, tola | +Rs7,900 | Rs457,236 | | Gold, 10g | +Rs6,773 | Rs392,006 | | Silver, tola | — | Rs6,942 | | International | +$79 | $4,347/oz |
The ten-gram figure reconciles with the tola rate, and the rise reconciles exactly against Wednesday’s Rs449,336.
A $79 move is the story
That is the largest single-session move in the international gold price this newspaper has recorded this month, and it is the classic haven reaction — the one that was conspicuously absent on 8 and 9 September, when gold fell while the Middle East escalated and we said twice that we could not explain it.
What changed in between: a drone destroyed near Makkah, a coalition declaring the holy sites a red line, Saudi Arabia rerouting crude through Oman, and a Pakistani defence minister saying a mutual defence pact has reached the point of implementation.
We are not asserting which of those the market priced. We are noting that gold has now behaved as expected on the week it had the most reason to.
Equities
The KSE-100 closed Wednesday at 168,021.80, down 1,370.52 points.
| Session | Close | Change | |—|—|—| | Monday 14 Sept | 167,970.66 | -2,541.20 | | Tuesday 15 Sept | 169,392.32 | +1,421.66 | | Wednesday 16 Sept | 168,021.80 | -1,370.52 |
Tuesday’s gain and Wednesday’s fall are within 51 points of cancelling each other out. The index has spent three sessions returning to where Monday left it.
Thursday, with the usual caveat
At 12:50pm on Thursday the index was at 169,524.90, up 1,503.10 points. That is intraday, not a close.
What is not established
Thursday’s close will not be known until after the bell. No analyst explanation for the gold move has been published in the reporting we have seen, and no turnover figures were given for Wednesday.
[Image: File photo via The Express Tribune]
