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By Bloomberg

Gold extended a weekly retreat as investors assessed the timing of higher U.S. borrowing costs amid slumping energy prices, with assets in the SPDR Gold Trust posting the longest period of decreases since May 2013.

Bullion for immediate delivery fell as much as 1.1 percent to $1,149.87 an ounce and traded at $1,153.41 at 3:29 p.m. in Singapore, down 2.1 percent this week, according to Bloomberg generic pricing. Holdings in the SPDR, the largest exchange- traded product backed by the metal, shrank to a six-year low of 720.62 metric tons yesterday, contracting for an eighth day.

Gold is set for the first consecutive annual loss since 2000 as oil prices at a four-year low erode demand for an inflation hedge, and the Federal Reserve moves closer to the first rate rise since 2006. Global demand slid 2.5 percent in the third quarter from a year earlier to the lowest since 2009, the World Gold Council said yesterday. The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index headed for the highest close in five years before a U.S. retail sales report today forecast to show a small increase.

“Unless some material change occurs in the U.S. economy, we believe a rate hike remains on the cards, keeping gold price weak,” Zhu Runyu, an analyst at CITIC Futures Co., a unit of China’s largest listed brokerage, said in an e-mail today.

Next week, the Fed will release minutes of its October 28-29 meeting, when it ended its asset-purchase program on schedule. New York Fed President William C. Dudley said yesterday that raising interest rates too early poses a bigger risk to the economy than acting too late.

Silver Drops

Gold for December delivery lost 0.8 percent to $1,152.40 an ounce on the Comex in New York, on course for a fourth week of declines. Most-active prices are 4.2 percent lower this year after losing 28 percent in 2013.

Silver for immediate delivery slid as much as 2.4 percent to $15.2806 an ounce, the lowest since Nov. 7, when the metal reached $15.0681, the lowest price since February 2010. Prices were at $15.37 and headed for a fifth weekly decline.

Spot platinum fell as much as 0.8 percent to $1,187 an ounce and traded at $1,192.38, set for a fifth week of declines. Platinum futures fell to $1,183.50 an ounce, the lowest level since July 2009. Spot palladium decreased 0.4 percent to $764.75 an ounce, extending a second weekly retreat.