Precious metals remained in negative territory on Friday afternoon, but well above the intra-day lows reached prior to the latest U.S. employment report.
COMEX gold futures – per the February contract – finished down by $25.70, or 1.5%, at $1,648.90 per ounce after earlier dropping to $1,626.00.
Silver futures – per the COMEX March contract – closed with a loss of $0.77, or 2.5%, at $29.95 per ounce after sliding to $29.24 this morning.
With the sell-off, gold and silver futures relinquished their gains from earlier this week to finish the holiday-shortened stretch with losses of 0.4% and 0.1%, respectively. In doing so, gold futures posted their sixth consecutive weekly decline for the first time since April-May of 2004.
Gold and silver stocks suffered another challenging session as well, with the Philadelphia Gold & Silver Index (XAU) dropping by 0.8% to 160.82 this afternoon. With the loss, the XAU returned to near unchanged on the week – after being up by as much as 5.8% on Wednesday.
(Check out GoldAlert Pro at http://pro.goldalert.com for rankings of every stock in the XAU, plus price targets, upgrades and downgrades)
This afternoon, notable gold producers in the red included Agnico-Eagle Mines (AEM) and IAMGOLD (IAG) – which fell by 2.2% to $50.39 and 1.9% to $10.93 per share, respectively. Among silver stocks, Hecla Mining (HL) slid by 2.5% to $5.73 while Silver Wheaton (SLW) lost 1.0% on its way to $35.27 per share.
Copyright Gold Alert All rights reserved.







![Introducing Skywhale: Canberra, Australia’s Controversial $300K Centenary Balloon [PHOTOS] Introducing Skywhale: Canberra, Australia’s Controversial $300K Centenary Balloon [PHOTOS]](http://s1.ibtimes.com/sites/www.ibtimes.com/files/styles/v2_multimedia/public/2013/05/14/skywhale.jpeg)
![Meet Ahmed Angel: The Greatest Internet Superstar. Ever. [PHOTOS] Meet Ahmed Angel: The Greatest Internet Superstar. Ever. [PHOTOS]](http://s1.ibtimes.com/sites/www.ibtimes.com/files/styles/v2_medium/public/2013/05/14/ahmed-angel.jpg)


![Airbus Shows Off The First A350 XWB, The Boeing 787's Rival [PHOTOS] Airbus Shows Off The First A350 XWB, The Boeing 787's Rival [PHOTOS]](http://s1.ibtimes.com/sites/www.ibtimes.com/files/styles/v2_medium/public/2013/05/13/a350.jpg)

![Lisalla Montenegro: Meet Angels Pitcher C.J. Wilson’s New Supermodel Fiancé [PHOTOS] Lisalla Montenegro: Meet Angels Pitcher C.J. Wilson’s New Supermodel Fiancé [PHOTOS]](http://s1.ibtimes.com/sites/www.ibtimes.com/files/styles/v2_medium/public/2013/05/10/lisalla-montenegro_3.jpg)

![Swallowed By Hippo: Paul Templer, River Guide, Attacked By Hippopotamus On Africa's Zambezi River [VIDEO] Swallowed By Hippo: Paul Templer, River Guide, Attacked By Hippopotamus On Africa's Zambezi River [VIDEO]](http://s1.ibtimes.com/sites/www.ibtimes.com/files/styles/v2_medium/public/2013/05/09/hippo.jpg)
















Like or Follow us for updates on the biggest stories!