Precious metals began backing off almost as soon as the day began thanks to stronger employment data being dealt. As far as the week as a whole is concerned, this one was particularly busy and brought with it a lot of useful data for investors to hawk over and discuss. For gold and silver, much of this data translated into nothing other than losses. Bringing this week to a close, metals are reeling and have lost significant value to finish the 5-day trading session.
Host of Employment Data Dealt
Something that made this week particularly exciting was the fact that there were a host of employment reports dealt from the US. The first of these reports came on Wednesday when the payrolls processor ADP published its reading on private-sector job growth during the month of July. To be fair, no one was expecting this piece of data to be particularly robust, so it was extremely shocking to see just shy of 200,000 jobs being added to the economy last month. As is typical of the ADP report, investors and market experts alike did not read into the data too heavily as it rarely coincides with the all-important non-farm payrolls report that was dealt today.
This piece of data, which was made public by the Department of Labor earlier in the morning, showed an astonishing number of jobs having been added to the US economy during the month of July. Even though expectations were for around an even 200,000 jobs to have been added to the economy, actual figures showed that there were actually 255,000 jobs created during the month of July. This not only shatters expectations, it is also something that will refuel the interest rate hike debate.
In addition to all of this data, the weekly jobless claims report was also dealt. This piece of data did not do much in the way of moving markets, but it was something investors needed to take in nonetheless. Officially, a few thousand more first-time claims for unemployment benefits were filed last week than the week before. Though this pushed the seasonally-adjusted average upward a bit, it did nothing to scare investors or have them think that the US employment situation is anything other than strong and improving all the time.
Central Banks Make Moves
Though it wasn’t the Federal Reserve this time, we do have some central bank policy changes to discuss. First it was Japan who unveiled an increased stimulus plan through which they will increase purchases of ETFs steadily over time. This move was made in response to a Japanese economy that continue to flounder and not make much progress. As a result, the Yen took a big hit in the immediate wake of this announcement and gave the greenback room to move forward.
In addition, the Bank of England announced on Thursday a host of policy changes aimed at calming the UK economy down in the wake of BRExit. Though there were quite a few changes to policy announced, one that stuck out more than others was the fact that UK interest rates were slashed by considerable margins. Reactions to these changes were mixed and did not end up having too much of an impact on the wider global marketplace.
As we move forward and look ahead to next week, there is not much that sticks out to investors nor market experts. It is highly anticipated that next week will be a typically slow August week with very few fresh pieces of economic data being made public. For gold and silver, Monday will be pivotal in determining which direction they head going forward. With much of the world’s reaction to today’s jobs data needing to wait until the time markets open on Monday, it is likely that metals may be beaten down further.