Gold miners slammed as gold dips to US$5K flat; oil meme trade continues to steal steam

Perhaps one of the most interesting things about the current Iran war in the Middle East is the way it’s changed the structural makeup of the active pool of oil traders: Right now, it’s full of retail.

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In fact, in early March, retail participation in oil trade jumped by over +1,200% on one popular platform; Dow Jones-affiliated writers carried by Morningstar have also posited last week that oil has become a new “meme stock.”

You don’t need an analyst to tell you that: Just look at Brent Crude charts.

And the run on (or into) oil stocks the Iran War has prompted has stolen the thunder of the major precious metals. No, I don’t mean silver, the more important one: Gold.

Over the last two weeks, a pattern has become clear. When oil goes up, gold goes down. Investors are rotating between the two, and for now, it looks like the market collectively reckons gold @ US$5K/oz is just about enough for now.

And that’s bad news for miners

With gold hitting US$5K/oz, and perhaps ahead of tomorrow’s widely expected rate hike from the RBA, the market is taking money out of gold miners.

Woodside Energy (ASX:WDS) and Karoon Energy (ASX:KAR) have enjoyed jumps on Monday, but neither is showing any dramatic gusto, suggesting the move might just be a response to precious metal benchmarks.

Take a look at the following carnage a/a 12am:

• Beacon Minerals (BCN) down -7.75% to $3.22/sh
• Bellevue Gold (BGL) down -7.6% to $1.51/sh
• Horizon Gold (HRN) down -7.2% to $1.42/sh
• New Murchison Gold (NMG) down -9.3% to 4.9cps
• Regis Resources (RRL) down -7.75% to $7.08/sh
• Unico Silver (USL) down -7.1% to 75cps
• Silver Mines (SVL) down -8.55% to 18cps

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