Precious metals are looking like they will wrap up the month of February with monthly losses. The last few weeks have been especially quiet, and for precious metals, the quiet nature of the global marketplace has not done spot values any favors. This week, though just as quiet as the last few, did play host to a few events worth paying attention to. Most notable of these events is the semi-annual address by Fed chairperson Janet Yellen to members of Congress regarding the US economy and US economic growth.
In other news, this week and the end of last week have seen little to no activity out of Asian markets. The reason for this is due to the fact that the Lunar New Year is currently being celebrated across Asia and has investors away from work. As the celebration wraps up, you can expect a good quantity of data to come from Asia over the course of the coming weeks.
Yellen Addresses Congress for Two Days
Beginning on Tuesday and carrying over into today, Janet Yellen has been speaking to Congress about the US economy and all that goes into it. In summation, Yellen maintains that the US economy is doing extremely well and is well ahead of the pace of growth currently being exhibited by other global economies. She said all of this in light of the fact that the first two months’ worth of economic data from the US has been less than stellar.
In addition to speaking about the strength of the economy, Yellen also touched on the prospect of interest rate hikes. While it is a known fact that interest rate hikes are coming some time in the future for the United States, no one has any idea when those hikes will come. According to Yellen’s remarks, it doesn’t even seem as though she knows when rate hikes will ensue either. She stated that the topic of raising interest rates is something that will be carried over and discussed from meeting to meeting.
The language she used to describe the eventual hiking of interest rates favored the doves and in turn helped out precious metals spot values. With that being said, however, spot values were only given a small boost today and are still looking at weekly losses. With two days to go, it will be interesting to see how metals finish up the week. There will be some US economic data made public, including the weekly jobless claims report, but I do not think any of it will have a major impact on the global economy nor spot values.
