MARKET HESITANT FROM FED MINUTES; IS EUROPE’S FINANCIAL CONDITION OUT OF CONTROL?
Precious Metals prices remain stable as the market remains unsure on the Federal Reserve’s future plans with quantitative easing programs. “Any time there is any concern about Fed tightening, those nervous Gold investors leave the market very quickly,” James Dailey, portfolio manager of TEAM Financial Asset Management, said. Currently, the Fed is purchasing $40 billion in mortgage-backed securities and $45 billion in Treasuries each month and plans to continue until the country’s unemployment rate improves significantly.
The European debt crisis has continued to spread into many countries, affecting the growth and stability of each economy. For instance, Spain has endured a full year with an unemployment rate exceeding 25 percent, and analysts suggest the country will probably see these numbers for an extended period of time. “No economy (as far as we are aware) has ever sustained this unemployment rate and maintained a peg to a fixed exchange rate,” Charles Robertson at Renaissance Capital said in a report. Most damaging of all, he said, was the absence of hope: “For households, wages are still likely to fall to boost competitiveness. Households are deleveraging and defaulting, not borrowing more to fuel consumption.”
At 5 p.m. (EST), the APMEX Precious Metals spot prices were:
- Gold, $1,649.30, Down $1.60.
- Silver, $30.22, Up $0.25.
- Platinum, $1,556.40, Down $1.10.
- Palladium, $670.40, Down $19.10.
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