Gold Spot Price Open: $1,311
Gold Spot Price Close: $1,313
Change in Gold Spot Price: +$2
Silver Spot Price Open: $19.84
Silver Spot Price Close: $19.92
Change in Silver Spot Price: +$0.08
Precious metals began the day looking as if they would finish posting impressive gains, but just as quickly as things got going, the momentum disappeared. When all was said and done, gold picked up a few dollars while silver managed to add around 8 cents. Platinum finished the day having posted minor losses, though palladium was able to add a few dollars.
US Jobless Claims Rise Considerably
There hasn’t been too much in the way of markets-moving economic data to speak of this week, but a US jobless claims report released earlier this morning had a momentary impact on the spot values of precious metals. According to the report, jobless claims this week exceeded 310,000. Last week, the same figure was right around 295,000. The unexpected rise in jobless claims initially put the US Dollar under pressure and gave precious metals a bit of a boost. After some time, however, metals were seen parring gains while the Dollar was able to rebound and finish the day in positive fashion.
Matthew Turner, an analyst at Macquarie, shed some light on why downtrodden pieces of US economic data have not been pushing metals too far forward. In an interview today, he said, “These data releases give gold a boost now and again as they are seen as restraining the more hawkish Fed governors, though they haven’t ever been enough to change medium-term expectations for the U.S. economy or gold.” Simply put, with so many investors expecting the US economy to continuously improve throughout the duration of this year, and even more expecting interest rates to be risen sometime next year, the buying interest surrounding precious metals is only a shadow of what it was a month or more ago.
More Downbeat Economic Data From Europe
Things just seem to keep getting worse for Europe after today yielded a few economic reports many Europeans would like to soon forget. First and foremost, it was reported that the EU’s second-quarter GDP remained unchanged from the first quarter of this year. Making matters worse were the GDP reports from Germany and France specifically, as they were far from what market analysts were expecting. As leading EU economies, it is more or less an expectation that Germany and France will pick up the slack created by more periphery EU economies. However, such has not been the case in recent weeks and months.
Today’s news only adds to recent fears regarding the EU’s economic recovery. As consumer prices continue to fall and deflation remains a top concern for ECB policymakers, it will be interesting to see what changes, if any, are made to EU monetary policy.
Despite moving all over the place today, the US Dollar was able to hold on to recent gains it made against the Euro currency. So long as the EU continues to emit poor economic data, there is no way of telling just how much progress the US Dollar stands to make throughout the duration of this year.
Wrap-Up
Looking ahead to the final day of the week, it is clear that investors will continue hawking over a relatively quiet marketplace. The Russian humanitarian aid convoy is still supposedly sitting just beyond the Russia-Ukraine border and is awaiting further instructions on how to proceed. Reports today indicated that the convoy of more than 200 vehicles may be headed for a border crossing currently manned by pro-Russian rebels, though this has yet to be confirmed. Regardless of where the convoy crosses, Ukrainian government and military leaders have vowed that it will not be allowed to travel very far. It will be interesting to see how this situation plays out over the last day of the week and into the weekend as it stands a very good chance of bringing about some renewed safe-haven demand for precious metals.
