Gold and Silver Market Update (3/30/2015) – Golden Eagle
Last week was a very mixed one for precious metals. The platinum group performed poorly, with rhodium going nowhere and palladium losing value. Gold and silver, however, both managed to climb again, raising hopes that a more positive trend could be establishing itself there. There’s still a lot of volatility both in the metals sector itself and in the global economy as a whole, so everything could change again very quickly, but for now gold and silver are looking a lot healthier than they have done for a while.
Gold has been trending generally upwards since the middle of the month and that continued last week. The overall rise was smaller than it could have been thanks to a sudden dip on Friday, probably caused by the week’s fall in the Dow Jones abruptly turning round, but the spot price still finished $16 up at $1,198.40. That’s tantalizingly close to the psychologically important $1,200 mark and it’s a slight disappointment gold fell back below that milestone after having broken through it on Thursday, but if the metal can haul itself up again this week we could see it safely passed before too long. That might give investors the extra confidence needed to boost demand.
It was also a fairly good week for silver. Again some of its gains were chopped away by a drop on Friday morning, but the period still saw silver closing 20 cents above the previous week at $16.97. It did go as high as $17.35 on Thursday and investors may have been unnerved by such a rapid climb, but it’s also a sign that there’s nothing to stop the price getting back above that level on a longer-term basis. So, like gold, silver is looking much healthier than it did at the start of March.
Moving on to the platinum group, the news isn’t so good. Platinum itself dropped close to $8 as soon as the markets opened on Monday, but then looked set to gain back all it had lost and more. It peaked Thursday at just over $1,150 but fell back on Friday like the other metals, closing the week at $1,136. That’s $2 up on the week before, a disappointing performance but at least not a losing one.
Palladium followed much the same course as platinum for most of the week, dropping early on Monday then steadily climbing again until Thursday. It all went wrong on Friday though, with a sudden sharp fall taking the spot price through the previous period’s final price of $773 then continuing on down. By the time trading finished it was selling for just $736, a loss of $37 or close to 5 percent.
Finally rhodium, which has been a very sluggish performer recently, carried on in the same vein. The price basically stayed unchanged all week, closing at $1,095 – just where it started on Monday. Thanks to gains the previous weekend that was still $10 above the Friday before, but not exciting at all.
So a mixed week for precious metals, with the platinum group very uninspiring but gold and silver seeming quite buoyant. It’s likely their rise was pushed by the considerable fall in equities through the period; if that continues this week we could easily see larger gains by gold and silver, and hopefully a recovery in the other metals too.
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. 
