Gold Spot Price Open: $1,328
Gold Spot Price Close: $1,329
Change in Gold Spot Price: +$1
Silver Spot Price Open: $21.19
Silver Spot Price Close: $21.24
Change in Silver Spot Price: +$0.05
Gold and silver traded up for a majority of the day, but were dealt with some pressure in the form of an improving US Dollar and some upbeat US economic data. When all was said and done, gold was able to add roughly one dollar while silver posted gains closer to 5 cents.
The main piece of news for investors to mull over today was an ADP employment report that outperformed the expectations of the marketplace. Despite market expectations of just more than 200,000 jobs added in June, the ADP report showed that over 280,000 were actually added. This news worked against gold and silver in the early morning hours but is mostly being taken in stride by investors who place much more emphasis on the US Labor Department’s employment report, which is due out tomorrow. As it stands, the market is expecting non-farms job growth to reach or exceed 215,000.
Also working against precious metals today was a slightly improved USD Index. The USD surged forward in value shortly after markets opened today and held their somewhat lofty positions until the time markets closed. It will be interesting to see if the greenback can improve upon today’s gains to close out the week or if the USD Index will fall right back down to where it was prior to today.
A report out of the European Union indicated that producer prices fell by .1% in April and were down by a whole percentage point on an annualized basis. This news does little to quell growing fears with regard to widespread deflation across Europe. With the European Central Bank scheduled to hold their monthly policy meeting tomorrow, it will be interesting to see if they address any of the last few weeks’ downtrodden economic data.
I expect tomorrow to be a fairly quiet trading day as most people will begin the long holiday weekend a day early.
