Spot gold hits in the roof

Spot gold, seen as a safe-haven investment, has gone through the roof, selling at $1,500 an ounce for the first time in more than six years as financial markets remain jittery. 

On Wall Street, the Dow Jones has fallen 2.24 percent to 25,446 while the Nasdaq is down 1.72 percent and the S&P 500 has lost 1.88 percent. 

Fears of a global downturn in the wake of trade disputes have driven traders to rush to the safety of government bonds. 

“Bonds are being bought in a panic mode,” Andrew Brenner, managing director at National Alliance Capital Markets, told Reuters. 

Earlier, European stock markets staged a recovery following a three-day sell-off as investors were cheered by White House assurances that the next round of trade talks with China would still go ahead in September. 

The central banks of New Zealand, India, and Thailand all cut interest rates today to prop up their countries’ faltering economies.