The precious metals market changed direction during the second part of the week. Both metals started off the week falling along with the rest of the commodities markets and Forex rates (e.g. the Euro/USD). In Europe the conditions haven’t improved: The new elections in Greece will be held on June 17. The ECB temporarily stopped lending to several Greek banks. Moody’s downgraded the Spanish Banks. These events along with the positive news of the U.S housing starts may have adversely affected bullion markets. On the other hand there was some positive news from Europe mainly the higher than expected growth rate of Germany’s GDP in the Q1 2012 (a growth rate of 0.5%).
On Thursday it was reported that the Philly Fed Index tumbled down to -5.8 in May. This news along with the recent minutes of the FOMC meeting from April may have rekindled the speculation around QE3. As a result gold and silver changed direction and rose on Thursday and Friday.
By the end of the week, gold edged up by 0.5% while silver slipped by 0.61%.
Here is a short recap of the changes in Bullion between May 14th and May 18th:
Precious Metals Recap:
Gold price declined during the first part of the week but rose at the last couple of days. During last week it rose by 0.5%; alternatively, during said time the average rate reached $1,564.3 /t. oz which is 2.44% below the previous week’s average rate of $1,603.46 /t. oz. Gold finished at $1,591.9 /t. oz.
Silver, unlike gold, declined on a weekly scale by 0.61%; furthermore, the average rate reached $28.07/t oz which is 4.44% below the previous week’s average $29.38/t oz.
During last week, the average daily percent change of gold increased by 0.11%; silver fell by an average daily rate of 0.09%.
The chart below shows the developments of precious metals, as their rates were normalized to 100 to May 11th. Bullion prices have declined during Monday through Wednesday but coming Thursday and Friday both metals traded up.
The second chart presents the daily percent changes of precious metals (or in other words the movement around the trend). Bullion prices sharply declined on Monday and Wednesday; their sharpest gain came on Thursday. Their daily percent changes ranged between nearly 3% gain and 3% loss.
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