Gold Spot Price Open: $1,265
Gold Spot Price Close: $1,270
Change in Gold Spot Price: +$5
Silver Spot Price Open: $19.20
Silver Spot Price Close: $19.25
Change in Silver Spot Price: +$0.05
Precious metals received a short-covering boost today after suffering significant losses only a day ago. When all was said and done, spot gold was seen clinging to gains of about 5 dollars while silver was able to pick up about a nickel. Platinum finished the day posting gains of a few dollars, but palladium fell by nearly ten.
Metals Receive Short-Covering Boost, Key Data Lies Ahead
After suffering massive losses to begin the week on Tuesday, precious metals were fortunate to take part in a bit of a bounce back today. Yesterday saw the selling pressure pile on and, as a result, spot gold was driven to a 10-month low. Though today was quiet from an economic standpoint, the next few days are shaping up to be quite busy.
Tomorrow, before US markets begin the day, the European Central Bank will convene for their monthly policy meeting. This meeting will be so important due to the fact that monetary policy changes are expected to be made in Europe sometime in the near future. Though it is not clear when the changes will be made or what type of stimulus will be implemented, the market will pay close attention nonetheless. Hopefully ECB president Mario Draghi, in his post-meeting statement, will shed some more light on the future of monetary policy across the EU.
On Friday, the market’s attention will shift towards the United States employment report for August. As of now, expectations are that more than 220,000 new jobs were added to the US economy last month. If such does prove to be the case, we can expect that the Fed will continue to wind down and subsequently due away with its Quantitative Easing monetary policy. Another potential outcome of an upbeat employment report will be added pressure on the US Federal Reserve to raise interest rates. As it stands, most investors are expecting that interest rates will be raised sometime in early 2015, though this has yet to be confirmed by any official source.
Ukrainian Tensions Making Headlines Again
The situation in Ukraine has been in a state of constant flux for the past 4 or more months, and the global marketplace has been paying attention the whole ride. In recent weeks, the situation has made headlines just as readily as it has been completely ignored. This week, news of a potential ceasefire has been circulating and, as of this morning, it was reported that a ceasefire between Russia, Ukraine, and pro-Russian rebels had been reached. As a result of the supposed ceasefire agreement, US stock indexes as well as most equity markets from around the world moved upward.
Surprisingly though, by midday, there were rumors circulating claiming that Russia had never taken part in any ceasefire agreement. This news caused US equity markets to sputter a bit and allowed precious metals to retain what marginal gains they had made up to that point. As of the writing of this post, it is still unclear as to whether a ceasefire has been reached, or if that was all smoke and mirrors. We will continue to monitor the situation in Ukraine and hopefully get to the bottom of this supposed ceasefire.
Wrap-Up
Though today was a fairly quiet day, I can assure you that the next few days will not be anywhere near as calm. There will be a flurry of economic activity to close out the week, and all of it will be hawked over by investors very carefully. What’s more, the investing world will be wanting to find out more about this rumored ceasefire agreement as a stopping of the violence in Ukraine would mark a very big step in peacemaking process.
