Gold Spot Price Open: $1,241
Gold Spot Price Close: $1,234
Change in Gold Spot Price: -$7
Silver Spot Price Open: $15.51
Silver Spot Price Close: $15.25
Change in Silver Spot Price: -$0.26
Both gold and silver continued to slide on Tuesday as profit-taking continued to take its toll. When all was said and done, gold lost close to another ten dollars while silver declined by about twenty five cents. Platinum and palladium finished the day mixed, but neither metal moved too far from where it began the day.
Poor Economic Data Drives Dollar Downward
Against most rival currencies, but especially the euro, the US Dollar trended downward on Tuesday thanks to a few pieces of less than stellar economic data. First was a report from the US Commerce Department which indicated that retail sales fell by .1% in February. Though it was disappointing to see retail sales take a step backwards, today’s data was more or less in line with what was expected from the data. Making the data err on the side of poor was the fact that January’s retail sales were revised downward from a previously recorded .2% gain to a new reading of -.4%.
After that, it was the US Department of Labor which pointed to a .2% producer price index decline in February. Once again, this report was in line with the expectations of investors and market watchers. All of this data is coming as the Fed sits down for their monthly policy meeting, which is expected to wrap up tomorrow afternoon.
At the present moment in time there are not many people expecting the Fed to make changes to monetary policy. With that said, however, investors will be keeping a close eye on what the Fed, particularly Janet Yellen, has to say about what the future might hold for interest rates as well as monetary policy as a whole. For now, most are not expecting interest rates to be touched until much later in the Spring at the earliest.
Oil Continues to Decline
After taking a beating on Monday, crude oil prices were back to moving lower the minute markets opened back up on Tuesday. As surprising as it may seem, the same factor that propped up oil prices towards the end of last week is working to push them downward this 5-day trading session.
It was reported that in 5 days OPEC is going to meet in order to discuss the possibility and feasibility of a temporary supply freeze. While, on paper, this may sound fine and good, investors and market experts alike are beginning to realize just how difficult it may be to institute a supply freeze. Like was stated last week, some OPEC countries can simply not afford to do without oil revenues for even a short period of time. Many of these countries rely almost solely on oil, and if that were to be cut off for even a few weeks it would mean devastating consequences for the economy as a whole. For this reason many investors do not see the March 20th OPEC meeting yielding much of any results.
In addition to some countries not being able to afford a production freeze, the feeling is that if OPEC nations freeze production, Iran will only ramp theirs up. If this happens then the OPEC production freeze will be for naught. For this reason, I am not envisioning the crude oil market making much of a recovery in the near-term.
Wrap-Up
Today offered up a surprising bit of economic data, but the real attention is being placed on the FOMC meeting which kicked off today and will wrap up tomorrow afternoon. Though no changes to monetary policy are expected, everyone will be hanging on every one of Janet Yellen’s words come tomorrow afternoon. Other than that, there isn’t much on the slate for this week as far as markets-moving economic data is concerned.