Precious metals have not moved far from where they opened, but what little movement has taken place has mostly been downward. This week, being the holiday week that it is, is set to bring about almost nothing in the way of economic data, and even less in the way of market activity. A large majority of traders and business people have taken a large majority of the trading week off in order to be with friends and family, so it really isn’t surprising that things have remained this quiet.
With that said, however, it is important to mention that even though this week is abbreviated due to the Christmas holiday, we have already been dealt a decent bit of economic data. Unfortunately for gold and silver, that data proved to add pressure and cause losses to pile up. As we look ahead to the rest of this week and the next one, it is likely that things will remain just as quiet as they have been through the first half of today. Not only is it holiday season, the end of the year is fast-approaching, and most investors are content to simply hold their positions and await the dawning of a new year.
US GDP Revised Upward
Though we are soon going to be receiving the 4th-quarter GDP report for the United States, Tuesday brought about a revision from the 3rd-quarter’s report. According to the commerce department’s revision, the US economy grew by a solid 5% from July-September of 2014. The report released yesterday saw the GDP figure updated from a previous reading of over 3% annualized growth.
As you could have probably guessed, this revision allowed stock markets in the US as well as the US Dollar to make nice moves upward. Japanese and European stocks followed the lead of those from the US and also had a a good, solid start to this abbreviated week of holiday trading. Despite worries regarding a possible global economic slowdown spreading like wildfire only a week or so ago, the market now seems confident that global economy is not in such poor shape after all.
For gold and silver, the renewed interest in stock investments is nothing short of disastrous. This is so because as investors become more interested in taking risks on the stock markets of the world, their interest in safe-haven gold and silver will, and is, diminish(ing) rapidly. For this reason, the plentiful batches of economic data that help us ring in the New Year will undoubtedly shape the near-term future of gold and silver’s price charts.