Gold & Silver Market 8-8-2015
Last week was no better for precious metals than the one before; although there wasn’t much movement Friday to Friday in the key gold and silver markets we did see some losses across the platinum group. The general outlook is still negative, and this week’s performance deserves some close attention.
Looking at gold, there really wasn’t a lot of movement at the weekly level; the spot price ended up $1.40 down at $1,093.80. That tiny change disguises some day to day movements though. Early in the week it looked as if we were going to see more losses, after gold fell significantly in weekend trading. However as Friday approached the price began to pick up again, and by Friday was more or less back where it started. There’s no sign of any strong support, and we’d have expected a better result given the weakness of both oil and the Dow Jones, but it could have been a lot worse.
The picture with silver was very similar. An initial slide took the price all the way down to $14.50, but by Friday it was selling for $14.81 an ounce. That’s two cents higher than the week before, again not enough of a change to mean very much, but there were some promising signs of values rising in other currencies. The current weakness of both silver and gold could be down more to the strength of the dollar than any major issue with the metals themselves.
Moving on, the platinum group saw some depressing results. Again, weekend trading seems to have been pessimistic and platinum fell sharply through Sunday. By the time normal trading began the spot price was $21 down at $960. The decline slowed over the next few days, finally reaching a new low of $946 on Wednesday, before recovering well for the last two days. Friday saw it at $961, an overall loss of $20.
Palladium followed much the same track, plummeting over the weekend. It did pick up a few dollars Monday before turning down again, setting a three-year low of $592 on Wednesday, before rebounding slightly to finish the week at $599. That puts it $10 down, just under 2 percent. Expect it to fall below $600 this week.
Lastly rhodium, and for a change this was the strongest performer (and the only one to post a significant rise). The steep fall that ended the previous week more or less levelled out over the weekend and through Monday, before starting to pick up Tuesday. The rise gathered speed in the last two days of the week and the final price was $823. That’s $48 up, a very good performance from a metal that’s done very poorly over the past year. Don’t rely on it staying up though – if you made money on rhodium last week be ready to sell as soon as it stops rising.
So yet another depressing week, despite sluggishness on the equities markets. With the weak Dow we’d hoped to see a real recovery for gold, and probably silver too. With supply static, though, prices don’t have much more room to fall, so stocking up could be a good idea.
About the Author: Clint Stelfox
Clint is the director of marketing at Golden Eagle Coins. Son of Richard Stelfox, co-founder of the company, Clint has been living and breathing coins his entire life. After trading for a Philadelphia Stock Exchange firm for several years Clint returned to give Golden Eagle the online presence it has today. 
