MTECHTIPS COMMODITY NEWS 1

MTECHTIPS:-Crude dips as Hurricane Sandy threatens U.S. coast

Crude oil futures fell in Asian trading on Monday as Hurricane Sandy threatened to converge with other weather systems into a super storm and disrupt oil operations along a wide swath of the U.S. east coast.On the New York Mercantile Exchange, light, sweet crude futures for delivery in December traded at USD85.98 a barrel on Monday, down 0.34%, off from a session high of USD86.08 and up from an earlier session low of USD85.94.Sandy's wind field will cover a wide area of the U.S. eastern seaboard, prompting refineries in the area to scale back on crude purchases, which pushed down prices as did concerns that inventories were on the rise in the U.S.Late last week, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said in its weekly report that U.S. crude oil inventories jumped up by 5.9 million barrels in the week ended October 19, well beyond market calls for an increase of 1.9 million barrels.Total U.S. crude oil inventories stood at 375.1 million barrels as of last week.

MTECHTIPS:-Gold rises on hopes for continued monetary stimulus

Gold prices rose on Monday on hopes central banks around the world will loosen already very loose monetary policies if the global economy fails to pick up.The Federal Reserve announced last week it was making no changes to its benchmark interest rates and added monetary policy will likely stay loose for some time to come.On the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange, gold futures for December delivery were up 0.18% at USD1,715.05 a troy ounce, up from a session low of USD1,714.45 and down from a high of USD1,716.55 a troy ounce.Gold futures were likely to test support at USD1,701.45 a troy ounce, Friday's low, and resistance at USD1,719.35, Fridays' high.In the U.S., the Federal Reserve announced earlier that it left interest rates near zero and monetary policy unchanged, pointing out that elevated unemployment rates and headwinds from abroad merit ongoing asset purchases from banks, a monetary policy tool known as quantitative easing that weakens the dollar, gold's traditional hedge. The U.S. central bank emphasized it will continue intervening until the economy and labor market improve."If the outlook for the labor market does not improve substantially, the Committee will continue its purchases of agency mortgage-backed securities, undertake additional asset purchases, and employ its other policy tools as appropriate until such improvement is achieved in a context of price stability," the Fed said in a statement.

MTECHTIPS:-Stimulus hopes mark Gold prices a tad up on Comexes

The US Federal Reserve has left the interest rates and monetary policy to its own last week and the gold prices are seen responding positively to this development.Besides there are hopes that the Bank of Japan, ECB or European Central Bank and PBOC or People's Bank of China could come up with measures in monetary policy that would lend some upside to the currency mints making them work aggressively round the clock.A proliferation in currency volumes is always bullish for gold.Thered be some heightened level of expectation the Bank of Japan would have to move on some sort of further stimulus,Last week the government there provided a monetary injection worth 750 billion yen ($9.4 billion) to give the nation a pair of new claws.Japan is the third largest economy in the world preceded only by US and China.