KITCO NEWS — Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen moves the central bank closer to a December rate hike, and gold prices remain under pressure this Wednesday. However, one senior market strategist says sentiment towards gold is too bearish. ‘I think this is interesting because everybody thinks the Fed’s going to lift off and gold’s just going to continue to plummet, and I don’t think that’s going to happen,’ Bill Baruch of iiTrader told Kitco News Wednesday afternoon, following Yellen’s speech. ‘Now that everybody is so bearish [on gold], who is left to sell?’ he added. February comex gold futures were last quoted down $10.20 at $1,053.30 an ounce. According to Baruch, he expects the Fed to raise rates this month. ‘We have reasons to start to move these rates up. Yes, the timing is a little bad, but they waited this out,’ he said. ‘We are just lifting this off a quarter of a point, just to get them off the ground. It’s necessary to do.’ One of the major factors pressuring gold has been the stronger U.S. dollar, which Baruch said, he remains bullish on. ‘I’ve been looking at the 102 level for quite some time and I think the market can get there,’ he says. The U.S. dollar index was last quoted up $0.18 at $99.96. However, he adds that he will be looking at the European Central Bank’s moves over the course of the coming year to see where the dollar will move next. ‘What’s going to put it there, it’s not going to be the U.S., it’s going to be Europe. It’s [the European Central Banks’s] path over the next year that will push the dollar higher.’
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