Summary

• Gold ended April flat, weighed down by a return of risk appetite. But a weaker US dollar and ETF inflows led by Europe provided support.
• Short-term headwinds could sustain some gold weakness as it searches for a catalyst to regain the structural uptrend.
• Markets appear to be treating the Middle East crisis as transitory, which is weighing on gold.

Gold closed at US$4,611/oz, flat for the month of April. Across most major currencies, gold lost a little ground on a weaker US dollar (Table 1).

Our Gold Return Attribution Model (GRAM) suggests that a