Mid-Day Gold & Silver Market Report, 06/28/2012

Brandi Brundidge

6/28/2012 12:22:00 PM

PRESSURE ON GOLD CONTINUES; HEALTH CARE REFORM RULED CONSTITUTIONAL  

Pressure on Gold continued during midday trading, as the price was flirting with four week lows. Concerns abound that the upcoming European Union summit is not going to yield measures strong enough to deal with the debt crisis in the region. German Chancellor Angela Merkel is sticking to Germany’s position in opposing joint eurozone debt. “Something needs to happen for Gold to rally, and it’s not happening at the moment,” Citigroup analyst David Wilson said. “The chances are that Europe will continue sticking plasters over the debt issue, so that will keep grinding on. It’s difficult to see what’s going to push Gold up,” he said.

This past week showed little improvement in the American labor market, as applications for unemployment benefits approached a high for the year. Concerns over the eurozone debt crisis and the potential end of the Bush era tax cuts have many employers running lean in terms of their headcounts. “There is no progress,” said Jeremy Lawson, a senior U.S. economist at BNP Paribas in New York. “There is clearly an underlying weakness that is troubling. The labor market is sputtering along, struggling to create jobs. The pace of consumer spending will slow in the second quarter.”

The “individual mandate” portion of President Barack Obama’s health care reform act has been upheld as constitutional in today’s 5 to 4 Supreme Court ruling. This ruling comes just months before the presidential election, and Republicans are vowing to push for a repeal of the bill. While the long term effect of this ruling is not clear, it will be interesting to see how this affects the broader economy going forward.

At 1 p.m. (EDT), the APMEX Precious Metals spot prices were:

• Gold, $1,553.70, Down $26.20.
• Silver, $26.38, Down $0.68.
• Platinum, $1,391.00, Down $20.80.
• Palladium, $565.40, Down $15.30.

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