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Many times, we had talked
about economic stability and precious metals markets and how significantly
macroeconomic data influence the prices. While Greece is almost at the brim
of a potential non-equilibrium, here comes again the scenario economic
stability vs. precious metals. Let’s begin today’s session with a
letter from one of our Subscribers. You might have noticed that we had been
starting our last few free commentaries with answering our Subscriber’s
questions. Although we don’t want to get habituated by this style, we
thought including questions in commentaries would provide all our readers an
option to realize where we stand in terms of our market views.
Here is the question:
I'm not a trader per se, though I'm short term
bearish on silver. I'm in ZSL so I don't see any real short term strength in
silver or gold. If gold and silver were little moved by events in Europe, I
think this is a real weak sign for both metals. So if Europe over the weekend
has even a short term solution for Greece, this should hurt both gold and
silver. Secondly, when the U.S. comes to a deal on the debt ceiling, and they
will despite the politicking going on now, this will be positive for the U.S.
dollar and the stock market; however, the risk premium in gold and silver
will pop like a balloon and we'll see much lower prices. Just my thoughts,
I'm interested in your opinion on this.
And here are our thoughts
on this topic:
As far as the solution for Europe is concerned
(concerning Greece), it seems that much depends on what the solution will be.
If it will roughly translate to "all right, we'll print more euros -
don't worry, you're safe", it will be bearish for this currency and
bullish for the USD Index. At this point this is what the charts are
suggesting. However, since gold has been recently positively correlated with
euro (and negatively with the USD Index) it might not be bullish for gold.
That is counter-intuitive as printing money should be viewed as something
that would cause one to want to hedge by buying gold. However, at the same
time markets could believe that this will indeed provide a "relief"
to the Eurozone and this could make gold appear less attractive as gold
usually thrives on fear.
As far as our thoughts on the general stock market are concerned, it seems
that higher value of the USD would not be too good for US Exporters, which
would translate into overall lower values for stock indices. While the
short-term correlation between stocks and metals are weak at this moment, the
medium-term ones are rather high, so if we would see a bigger decline in
stocks, it could make metals move lower as well.
We will now turn to the technical portion with the
analysis of the Euro Index chart (charts courtesy by http://stockcharts.com.)
 
The Euro Index levels bounced after temporarily
moving below the declining support line created by the 2008 and 2009 tops.
This support level is indeed significant.
The current index level is close to the local top
seen late in 2010, so a pause here appears to be justified. The short-term
trend still appears to be down but the medium-term trend seems to be up. If
the current downtrend continues and the Euro Index reaches the red, rising
support line in our chart, this will likely cause precious metals’ prices
to move much lower. Please note that the medium-term outlook here is not
overly important to the short-term outlook for the precious metals sector.
In the short-term Euro Index chart, we see that a
support level based on the late 2010 top has been touched. It is certainly
possible that a contra-trend rally may be seen from here; however, we
don’t think it would be a big one.
The cyclical tendencies of the Euro Index indicate
that local tops repeat every two and a half weeks or so. Consequently, a
local top is possible in the near days but this will be seen only if index
levels reverse and move higher beforehand. This possibility is similar to
what was seen in mid-May when a small rally led to slightly higher index
level values but at the same time it did not really invalidate the previous
downtrend.
As we have discussed in last week’s commentary
Fundamentals,
Technicals and Silver – Be Cautious!,
silver’s cyclical turning point is coming up soon. This could mean that
we may see a significant decline or possibly (and it seems a little more
likely than not at this point) a slight move higher for a few days and then a
decline. That would coincide with cyclical euro turning points examined
earlier – local top with euro could be seen very close to a local top
in silver.
Before summarizing, let’s have a look at the
Dollar Index values too.
In the long-term USD Index chart, we see a similar
(but opposite) outlook to what we discussed in the Euro Index chart.
Resistance levels have been reached and a pause and/or some sideways movement
may be seen. Perhaps the index could even decline slightly. On the other
hand, there is a good possibility that a breakout could be seen soon after
that and this would likely result in considerably lower prices for gold.
Summing up, the outlook is slightly bearish for the dollar in
the immediate term although bullish for the short term. It appears that some
sideways movement or slight declines could be followed by higher USD Index
levels. Consequently, the implication for gold is rather positive in the
immediate term (several days) and bearish soon after that.
To make sure that you are notified once the new
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Thank you for reading. Have a great and profitable week!
Przemyslaw
Radomski
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