Gold and silver have posted modest losses in the early parts of Wednesday as the USD is making some strong gains. Employment data out of the United States came back better than expected which put even more selling pressure on gold and silver. After making some decent gains through the first few days of the year precious metals have since began falling right back down towards low-points experienced towards the end of December.
Later this afternoon the latest FOMC minutes will be released for investors to mull over and speculate.
Stronger Dollar, Employment Data
In the early morning hours the USD rose to a month and a half high and began piling the pressure on precious metals before trading had even begun in the US. Through the morning the Dollar remains strong as gold and silver spot values decline further.
The ADP employment report for December was published today and came back beating market expectations. It was reported that nearly 240,000 jobs were added this past month, beating the 200,000 job increase that investors were expecting. This news prompted the US Dollar to gain even more value and seemed to have sealed the fate of precious metals for the day. The non-farm payrolls data scheduled to be published on Friday is also expected to see 200,000 non-farm jobs added a month ago, yet another sign that the overall US employment sector is gaining strength.
The Federal Open Market Committee minutes that are being released later today are of great importance to investors. This is so because everyone is hoping that the minutes will shed some more light on why the Fed decided to announce its QE tapering decision last month. Additionally, investors would also like to find out some more distinctive information with regard to whether or not the Fed plans on tapering QE further at any time during this year.
Also worth mentioning is the fact that the European Central Bank is scheduled to hold their monthly policy meeting tomorrow. At this juncture, no major policy changes are expected to come as a result of tomorrow’s meeting.