Oil and gold diverged a second straight day on Thursday, after a dim view of the U.S. economy by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke pushed oil prices lower while gold was boosted by expectations of $300 billion jobs plan by President Barack Obama.

Caution was discernible across markets as investors tried to gauge the potential impact of Obama’s new stimulus plan, to be presented to Congress at 7:00 p.m. EDT (2300 GMT). Some expect the “American Jobs Act” to be opposed by Republican politicians, like other Obama initiatives.

Gold and safehavens such as U.S. Treasuries rallied, while stocks on Wall Street and economicallysensitive resources like oil and copper fell. The 19commodity ReutersJefferies CRB index settled flat.

“I’d be interested to see how the President’s speech outlines another $300 billion in stimulus to boost the economy, all of which will be bullish for gold,” said Sean McGillivray, head of asset allocation at Great Pacific Wealth Management in Grants Pass, Oregon.

Both the spot price and futures of gold rose 3 percent. Oil futures fell 0.3 percent in New York and more than 1 percent in London.

Gold and oil often move in the same direction as they respond similarly to inflationary pressure.

Reuters data showed the positive correlation that had existed between gold and oil since October 2010 had largely broken down since the start of August as gold acted more as a safehaven lately while oil suffered from economic woes.

Late Thursday in New York, spot gold, which tracks trades in bullion, was up more than $50 at near $1,870 an ounce.

U.S. gold futures for December delivery also jumped more than $50 to above $1,873 an ounce in postsettlement trade, after finishing the official session up 2.2 percent at $1,857.50.

Reuters data showed gold prices have moved by more than $50 only 16 times in the past 40 years, with seven of those moves occurring in the past month alone.

For the year thus far, both the spot and futures prices have risen more than 30 percent, heading closer to the $2,000 per ounce target long anticipated by gold bulls.

“The fundamentals are in place for gold as a safehaven, but expect a lot of volatility as it is a very small market compared to U.S. Treasuries, and there’s so much attention on it now, so market swings will be the norm,” said McGillivray at Great Pacific.

In oil, benchmark U.S. crude in New York settled down 29 cents at $89.05 a barrel. In London, Brent crude finished down $1.25 at $114.55 a barrel.

Aside from the uncertainties surrounding Obama’s jobs plan, oil prices also took hit from a lack of details in Bernanke’s speech earlier on Thursday on boosting the economy.

Bernanke said the U.S. central bank would spare no effort to boost disappointingly weak growth and reduce unemployment, but gave no clues of the steps the Fed might take. He also downplayed concerns about inflation, which is key to higher commodity prices. – Reuters