Morning Gold & Silver Market Report – 3/19/2013

Ryan Schwimmer

3/19/2013 8:14:00 AM

FOMC BEGINS TODAY; CYPRUS TAX VOTE EXPECTED

Precious Metals are mostly flat this morning with Gold and Silver taking a slight lean to the downside. The latest policy meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee begins today. HSBC said in a note, “(We) expect the FOMC to reaffirm its commitment to the current quantitative easing policy and to offer no hint that it will alter the policy in the near term … Uncertainties surrounding the potential withdraw of QE contributed to Gold's sell-off earlier this year. Given this, clarity on the FOMC's QE exit strategy may help ease such concerns and lend support to Gold.”

The eurozone’s bailout of Cyprus, and the peculiar extenuating circumstances surrounding it, pushed the Gold price above the $1,600 mark over the weekend. The Cyprus legislature’s vote on the key piece of the bailout, the tax on bank deposits, was postponed and should take place today (unless it is postponed again). If the tax levy does not pass, the country will not receive its bailout, and default will loom. Some are even speculating that such a result could start a chain reaction with much larger consequences on the eurozone as a whole.

At 9 a.m. (EDT), the APMEX Precious Metals spot prices were:

• Gold, $1,604.80, Down $2.30.
• Silver, $28.83, Down $0.11.
• Platinum, $1,582.20, Up $1.00
• Palladium, $760.20, Down $3.60.