FOMC Keeps Policy Unchanged; Gold is Falling –FOMC Meeting

As expected there weren’t any major headlines coming out of the recent FOMC meeting, which was the second Federal Open Market Committee meeting for 2012. The Fed stated it sees signs of recovery in the U.S. economy in recent month and thus decided to keep the current plan unchanged including: keeping rates low and not introducing additional stimulus plans for now. Currently gold price is tumbling down.

The FOMC referred to the progress of the U.S. labor market; the recent non-farm employment report is backing up this claim. The Fed decided to continue with its program “to extend the average maturity of its holdings of securities as announced in September“, without introducing any additional stimulus plans.

The U.S. inflation slightly rose last month to an annual rate of 2.3% (for the core CPI). This isn’t something that should bother the FOMC for the time being. The FOMC will maintain its pledge of keeping the low interest rates at 0 to 0.25% at least until late 2014.

This news may drag down bullion prices and also further strengthen the U.S dollar.

Following the release of this statement and the recent update on the rally in U.S retail sales during last month, the U.S. stock markets are rising, the U.S. dollar is sharply appreciating against major currencies including the Euro and gold price is tumbling down.

Euros to US dollar exchange rate is currently traded down at 1.3068 a 0.65% decrease as of 19:49*.

Current gold price, short term futures (April 2012 delivery) is traded at $1,685.0 per t oz. a $14.8 decrease as of 19:49*.

Current silver price, short term futures (April 2012 delivery) is traded at $33.555 per t oz. a $0.142 increase as of 19:49*.

(* GMT)

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