Platinum inches lower for first time in 7 sessions as dollar continues to rise

Platinum prices tilted lower on Thursday, to continue for the second session to bounce back from the highest since November 7, as the US dollar continues to recover from its lowest since November 5 for the fourth straight session, in line with the inverse relation between them, while market participants await the release of several US economic data later today, amid the recent developments in the trade war, which passed its first year already. 

Platinum prices fell by 0.05% to $916.80 an ounce as of 05:31 GMT, from the opening of $917.29, while the dollar index rose by 0.02 to 97.88 points after opening at 97.86. 

Investors are anticipating the release of the US unemployment reading for the previous week, with forecasts to decline by 10K to 215K applications vs. 225K, while the continuing claims reading is expected to reach 1,683K applications for the week ended Nov.9.

This coupled with the release of Philadelphia industrial index, with forecasts for an expansion to 7.0 from 5.6 in October, while the existing home sales reading is expected to rise by 2.1% to 5.49 million, vs. decline by 2.2% at 5.2.2 million last September.

The CB leading index will also be released, with forecasts to decline by 0.1% in October, this comes after the Federal Reserve revealed the minutes of its recent meeting at October 29-30, which saw the third interest rate cut this year, by 25 basis points to between 1.50% and 1.75%.

On the other hand, markets are still pessimistic about the US and China ability to reach a trade agreement ahead of the end of this year, before Washington begin the forthcoming tariffs hike on Chinese goods scheduled for December 15, especially after President Trump threatened more tariff hikes if China didn't sign a trade deal with the US.