* QE3 gets muted response after weeks of anticipation
* Buy the rumor, hold on the fact as oil, copper a little
higher
* Gold highest since February; oil faces from 4-1/2 month
high
By Jonathan Leff
NEW YORK, Sept 13 (Reuters) – Major commodity markets,
including oil and copper, gave an initial tepid response to the
Federal Reserve’s third effort to revive the U.S. economy,
leaving gold the biggest beneficiary of a plan that has been
slowly baked into markets for weeks.
Prices jumped immediately on Thursday after the Fed said it
had agreed to buy $40 billion of mortgage debt per month and
continue to purchase assets until the outlook for jobs improves
substantially, meeting broad expectations for a third set of
quantitative easing to get growth back on track.
But an hour after the news hit, gold had extended gains to
more than 2 percent or $35, reaching its highest since February
at $1,765 an ounce, while oil and copper prices were only a bit
firmer, having first lurched higher and then lower. November
Brent crude was up 47 cents at $115.80 a barrel.
As the dust settled and traders awaited Chairman Ben
Bernanke’s press conference at 2:15 p.m. EDT (1815 GMT), a
consensus emerged that the Fed plan offered no reason for
despair, but likewise little cause for hope of an abrupt
economic turn-around that might boost demand for raw materials.
“The Fed has taken the middle road with a modest, defined
contribution purchase program and extended rate guidance,” said
Joseph Trevisani, chief market strategist at Worldwide Markets
in Woodcliff Lake, New Jersey.
In a plan that offered relatively few surprises, meeting
expectations for more bond buying and an extension of the Fed’s
ultra-low interest rate pledge to mid-2015, the most significant
shift was the committee’s decision to tie the duration of its
bond binge to economic conditions, rather than a finite sum.
U.S. stock markets pushed higher as the news settled in,
rising 1 percent. The U.S. dollar index fell 0.35 percent.
