Precious metals were able to post sharp gains on Tuesday, but are now feeling a bit of a corrective pullback just a day later. Last week’s weaker than anticipated US jobs report for March as well as recent news of additional unrest in Ukraine spiked interest in gold and silver on Tuesday, but things have pulled back a little bit as the market now anxiously awaits the FOMC minutes, due out today.
Currently, gold is still sitting above the $1,300 threshold, though silver has fallen back below $20 in the early hours of Wednesday.
FOMC Minutes Prove Vital
Only a week ago, investors were anxiously awaiting the release of March’s non-farm payrolls data. After members of the Fed very recently touted the strength of the US employment sector, the market was anticipating that March’s payrolls data would be particularly strong. As is too often the case, however, the jobs data fell short of the 206,000+ market expectations and instead showed that only 192,000 jobs were added to the economy last month. While 192,000 news jobs being added to the economy is nothing to scoff at, investors were discouraged to see this batch of data fall short after Janet Yellen and James Bullard both spoke so positively about US job growth.
As a result of the weaker US jobs data, investors are more fervently paying attention to today’s FOMC minutes. Over the past few months the FOMC minutes have consistently proven to move the market, and this time will likely not be any different.
In other news, the situation in Ukraine is back on the forefront of the marketplace’s attention after a recent spike in unrest throughout the country. At this juncture, a growing number of people are beginning to fear the possibility of a Ukrainian civil war. Recent unrest has not amounted to the type of violence we saw only a month or so ago, but investor are paying attention anyway. As has been the case for the past month or more, we will continue to analyze the crisis in Ukraine for any further developments.