The prices of gold and silver moved in an unclear trend during last week as they changed direction almost on a daily basis. But by the end of the of the week precious metals tumbled down following the release of the U.S non-farm payroll report, in which 195k jobs were added. This news raises the odds of the FOMC tapering QE3 in September or December 2013. Once the Fed will taper QE3, the U.S money base will rise at a slower pace, the odds of a sharp sudden rise in inflation will diminish and the demand for gold and silver as safe haven investments will further fall. The next FOMC meeting that at the end of July might shed some light on this issue. In other news: Jobless claims declined by 5k to reach 343k. ECB and BOE left their respective cash rates unchanged. The ECB president and BOE governor entertained the idea of keeping interest rates low or even lower than current level in the coming months. These headlines were enough to drag down the Euro and GB pound against the USD.
By the end of the week, the Euro fell by 1.39% against the USD; the Aussie dollar slipped by 0.78% against the USD. Gold price declined by 0.91%; silver, by 3.71%.
Here is a short review of the latest changes in precious metals prices between July 1st and July 5th:
Precious Metals Recap:
Gold price fell last week by 0.91%; furthermore, during the week, the average price reached $1,240.93 /t. oz which was 0.19% below last week’s average rate of $1,243.34/t. oz. Gold ended the week at $1,212.7 /t. oz.
Silver, even more than gold, tumbled down during last week by 3.71%; conversely, the average weekly rate was $19.32/t oz, which was 1.06% above last week’s rate $19.12/t oz.
During last week, the average daily percent changes of gold reached -0.205%; silver had an average daily change of -0.907%.
The chart below shows the developments in precious metals rates, in which their prices are normalized to 100 as of June 28th. Gold and silver prices moved in an unclear trend during last week.
The second chart shows the daily percent changes of precious metals prices (or in other words the shifts around the trend). Silver and gold changed direction almost on a daily basis during last week only to sharply fall on Friday. Precious metals prices daily percent shifts ranged between 2.6% gain and 4.9% drop.
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