Gold Spot Price Open: $1,208

Gold Spot Price Close: $1,213

Change in Gold Spot Price: +$5

Silver Spot Price Open: $16.52

Silver Spot Price Close: $16.68

Change in Silver Spot Price: +$0.16

Much to the surprise of many, precious metals posted follow-through gains on Tuesday to get the week off to a strong start. When all was said and done, gold gained about 5 dollars while silver improved to the tune of about 16 cents. Platinum and palladium posted mixed results, with platinum making gains near ten dollars while palladium lost roughly 2 dollars.

Monetary Policy Development On the Horizon

A Wall Street Journal report published today said that China is planning on, sometime in the near future, further easing its monetary policy. According to the report, the central bank of China is planning on encouraging local banks to purchase government bonds of all types, thus improving the liquidity of the financial system as a whole. For precious metals, today's WSJ report only helped push buying interest forward.

In other monetary policy news from around the world, the United States Federal Open Market Committee kicked off their April meeting today. Though the meeting is not set to wrap up until sometime tomorrow, investors have already put in their fair share of speculation regarding what, if any, changes will come from this week's meeting. Unfortunately, no Janet Yellen press conference is scheduled for after the meeting, so investors will have only the post-meeting statement to mull over and discuss. Nonetheless, I anticipate that tomorrow will be, if nothing else, a very interesting day.

Safe-Haven Demand Flourishing...For Now

Through the first two days of this week, and for a part of last week, we have seen safe-haven demand for precious metals tick up a bit. For one, investors have been constantly worried about Greece's future, both financially and as it pertains to their potential exit from the European Union. Another day has passed and the debt restructuring talks seem to be no closer to coming together. Instead, IMF and EU officials are very seriously planning for what happens if and when Greece misses a debt payment.

From the United States, focus remains on the Charm City as protesters and police forces clashed for another consecutive day. Though a curfew has been imposed on the city, many fear that tonight's unrest will be even worse than what we saw on Monday night. This bout of civil unrest has done well to feed into safe-haven demand for precious metals and will likely continue to do so so long as Baltimore resembles a war zone.

Looking at the wider picture, however, it is discouraging to say the least. While safe-haven demand is doing a good job of keeping spot values uplifted for the time being, it is difficult to imagine that either the situation surrounding Greece's debt or the unrest in Baltimore will carry on for all that much longer. These situations are being touted as temporary bullish factors, with the main emphasis being on the word "temporary."

Wrap-Up

Looking ahead to Wednesday, it is my guess that two events will take up the majority of investor attention. For one, investors will be anxious to hear of what, if anything, comes of this latest FOMC meeting. On the other hand, investors will also be keeping a close eye on Baltimore as the situation there only seems to grow more serious with each passing day. Though it is still early, this week very might finish with a bang.