Commodities Prices Mixed

Commodities prices were mixed early Friday, with metals lower across the board while natural gas and heating oil edged ahead.

Gold futures were down $3.20 to $668.20 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Silver was off 7 cents to $13.89 an ounce, and copper was down 4 cents at $2.64 a pound.

Crude oil slipped 31 cents to $57.68 a barrel, but natural gas advanced 9 cents to $7.38 per million British thermal units. Heating oil was fractionally higher at $1.63 a gallon. Gasoline slipped 1 cent to $1.59 a gallon.

Elsewhere, May cocoa futures on the Nymex were up $4 at $1,791 per metric ton. March coffee futures fell 1 cent to $1.14 a pound.