Gold Spot Price Open: $1,208
Gold Spot Price Close: $1,196
Change in Gold Spot Price: -$12
Silver Spot Price Open: $16.68
Silver Spot Price Close: $15.81
Change in Silver Spot Price: -$0.87
For a second consecutive day, both gold and silver lost a lot of what they gained last week. When all was said and done, gold lost more than ten dollars while silver was down by almost 90 cents. Platinum and palladium both finished the day down by about 15 dollars.
Risk-Off Day Ahead of FOMC Press Conference
A recent factor in the marketplace has been the volatility of global equity markets due to a diminishing outlook on global economic growth. Just last week, in fact, stocks from around the world trended lower on the news of more sub-par economic data from China and Europe. Though equities were able to bounce back a bit to close out last week, their volatile ways seem to be back as most equity markets spent the day trending downward.
While a downward trend on the part of equities may lead one to believe that gold and silver might have had a good day today, the fact of the matter is that US stocks were able to rebound a bit by the time markets closed. This bounce back of sorts put some more pressure on gold and silver, both of which have been under quite a good deal of pressure through the first two days of this week already.
Worries Stemming From Russia
The Russian ruble has seen better days, that much is a certainty. Today that much is definitely true as the ruble fell by about 15% and hit new record lows against the USD. The Russian economy, which has been ravaged by Western sanctions and the falling value of crude oil, is now performing at a dismal level despite recent central bank policy alterations aimed at making the economic situation of Russia a bit more respectable.
In fact, just today it was announced that the Russian central bank was pursuing an emergency plan that will see interest rates raised from 10.5% to 17%. Now, the eyes of the world fall upon Vladimir Putin and what he will do to help aid his failing economic system. Being that Putin has recently been flexing his military muscle, some fear that Putin may lash out militarily if certain sanctions are not lifted. That much, however, remains to be seen.
FOMC Press Conference Awaited
The big happening of the week is taking place over the course of today and tomorrow and involves the Federal Open Market Committee’s most recent meeting. The FOMC, which is the policy-making body of the US Federal Reserve, is rumored to be on the verge of announcing its plan for the hiking of interest in the United States.
Interest rate hikes have now been in the works for some time, but beyond the basic knowledge that, at some point in the future rates will be increased, no one really knows what is going on. According to speculation, however, that will all change upon the post-meeting press conference that will be held tomorrow afternoon. Though it is, up to this point unconfirmed, there are many investors who feel as though we will be given some fresh interest rate information by this time tomorrow afternoon. If that proves to be the case, it will be interesting to see what kind of effect it has on the spot values of gold and silver.
Wrap-Up
Looking ahead to the last three days of the week, investors will first and foremost preoccupy themselves with what the FOMC has to say upon the conclusion of their meeting tomorrow. Apart from that, however, there really isn’t that much economic data scheduled to be made public. What little data is expected to be published is not anticipated to move markets all that much. Still, I imagine that we are in for an exciting last few days of this week.
