Gold Spot Price Open: $1,254
Gold Spot Price Close: $1,255
Change in Gold Spot Price: +$1
Silver Spot Price Open: $20.37
Silver Spot Price Close: $20.40
Change in Silver Spot Price: +$0.03
Gold and silver traded near even all day, something that isn’t too surprising seeing as the US was celebrating the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. When all was said and done gold gained a single dollar while silver managed to pick up only a few pennies.
Thanks to the celebration of yet another holiday, trading volumes in the US and around the world were a bit lighter than usual. Nonetheless gold was able to sustain a month and a half high throughout the day to begin what many are hoping will be a breakthrough week for precious metals. After dipping below the $1,180 mark a little more than a month ago gold has since crawled its way back and has regained over $70. Now, investors are seeing the metal reach a turning point of sorts and will be curious to see whether the spot value of the yellow metal will continue to rise or whether outside pressures push the value down once again.
Physical demand for gold and silver is growing at each turn and will be facing off against fears that the Federal Reserve may further taper Quantitative Easing at their monthly policy meeting taking place a little more than a week from today. For the last two weeks or so the physical demand for precious metals has been one of the key factors keeping spot values at a respectable level. Low prices and a busy holiday season are two things that have helped physical demand and thus spot values. Should the Fed decide to taper QE even more, however, it would likely work against precious metals. As we inch ever closer to next week’s meeting it will be interesting to see what kind of shape investor speculation take. To that end, it will also be intriguing to see if any more voting members of the FOMC come make public statements the likes of which were made a week ago. In case you missed it, two voting members of the FOMC were quoted as saying that they want to see QE completely done away with by the end of this year. Even though two members is not enough to finalize such a decision, it is thought that these two members’ sentiments are also held by other FOMC members.