Bullion traders had to endure the worst week for gold and silver especially in the last couple of days of the week. The financial markets started the descent on Thursday as US stock markets sharply fell; US Dollar sharply appreciated against major currencies; major commodities prices including gold price and crude oil prices precipitately declined. Many attributed this sharp reaction in the financial markets to the disappointment from the Fed’s plan to purchase long term securities and no QE3 program. But the next day, most of the indexes and prices leveled out with crude oil prices slightly falling, USD deprecating and US stock markets regaining back some of their value. Yet, the bullion markets continues to fall very sharply: gold price closed the last trading day of the week with a 5.85% drop and silver price with a 17.71% decrease – the sharpest falls in a single day in 2011 for these precious metals. The freefall on Friday is partly due to the announcement made by CME to raise margin requirements for gold and silver contracts. These margin hikes will come into effect on Monday, September 26th. This means there is a good chance that gold and silver prices may continue to drop during Monday as well.
Here is a short review of the changes in gold and silver prices during the week of September 19th to September 23rd 2011:
Precious Metals Prices weekly summary:
Gold price sharply declined by 7.82% during the week; this week’s average gold price of $1,755 /t. oz sharply declined by 3.18% from the previous week’s average price of $1,813 /t. oz. Gold price finished the week at $1,639.8 /t. oz.
Silver price, even more than gold price, also sharply decreased by 23.14% from beginning to end, and this week’s average price was 37.46/t oz or 7.96% below the previous week’s average $40.46/t oz.
During the week, the average daily percent change of gold price decreased by 1.97%; silver price also declined by a very sharp rate of 5.62%.
In the chart below are the silver and gold prices that were normalized to 100 to the price at the beginning of the week – September 19th. It shows the weekly trend of gold and silver prices.
In the chart above gold and silver prices started the week with very moderate changes and a slight increase that only changed into a sharp fall in the last couple of days of the week.
The last chart is of the daily percent changes of silver and gold prices (or in other words the price changes around the trend). It shows that gold and silver prices started the week with moderate falls that changed on Tuesday and Wednesday to light gains; on Thursday and Friday gold and silver prices sharply fell. The sharpest falls for both precious metals came on Friday.
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For further reading:
- Gold & Silver Prices – Daily Outlook September 23
- Gold vs. U.S. Treasuries – Which is the True Safe Haven?
- Gold and silver prices outlook for September 2011
- Forex Market | Weekly Recap 19-23 September
Previous issues of weekly report:
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