Gold and silver are both trading down on what was quite an unusual day in the marketplace. A few economic reports, reports which were not expected to have much of an impact on metals at all, ended up putting a lot of downside pressure on gold and silver. The marketplace is still very much concerned with the crisis in Ukraine, but it has not had any real impact on spot values for a majority of this week.
As we head into the last day of the week and the weekend, however, it is likely that the investing world will once more fixate their attention on any and all developments stemming from the crisis in Ukraine. Seeing as last weekend’s referendum vote unofficially determined that the Donetsk region of Ukraine would be independent, there is likely to be more turmoil just around the bend. Pro-Russian rebels still have a very firm foothold throughout eastern and southern Ukraine, despite the Ukrainian military’s best efforts to oust them.
US Economic Data Shifts Spot Values Slightly
When this week began, investors were not expecting to pay too much attention to any of the week’s economic reports. That all changed today thanks to a weekly jobless claims report that showed the lowest number of claims in more than a year. What’s more, today’s release of the latest consumer price index showed that prices did not change much. This news prompted the US Dollar to post some gains while simultaneously putting downward pressure on precious metals.
Now, as the week draws to a close, it is clear to see that investors are expressing more of a risk-on attitude. Market analysts are confused about this risk-on attitude as the ongoing crisis in Ukraine should be fostering nothing other than safe-haven demand for precious metals. Instead, some market analysts think that the growing deflationary concerns in Europe and growing possibility that the ECB will implement some sort of monetary stimulus measures in the near future are driving this risk-on attitude.
Nonetheless, it will be interesting to see how investors are acting towards the end of the day tomorrow as that will give us some sort of insight as to what direction metals will head in over the weekend. If the crisis in Ukraine brings about any new developments over the weekend it will undoubtedly have some sort of impact on the precious metals market.