Good morning, traders. Welcome back to our preview of the macroeconomic calendar, relevant to the precious metals and currency markets, for the week ahead.
The price of gold is considerably lower this morning, having broken back below the $1500/oz level while silver spot prices have also retreated from last week’s mark of $18/oz.
The weakness in metals to begin this week was initially driven by a rebound in risk appetite in foreign markets as we’re seeing some trade optimism in China, and in Europe we now have the EU agreement to a Brexit “flextension” through January 31. US traders have been primarily responsible for the selling in gold markets however, as we have the S&P reaching new intraday highs alongside a strong start for US stocks as a whole; the yield on the US 10 year has also risen above 1.8%.
The week’s meaningful flow of data doesn’t really get started until Wednesday—Tuesday morning’s docket does have the Case-Shiller home price update for August, but frankly it’s a number that’s only brought low-energy feedback to the metals and Dollar markets lately, and with more pertinent data sets ahead this week I would expect it to be muted out. Once things get going on Wednesday though, it’s a pretty packed backend to the week. There are multiple opportunities here for this morning’s risk-on sentiment to turn—though as always the devil will be in the details of the FOMC statement—and that’s without accounting for the tense narratives we continue to track in regards to US-China trade negotiations, and the increasing odds of formal impeachment proceedings against the US President.
Read more on the gold price preview for this week on the GoldPrice.org website HERE
