Before we get down to the charts, let's look around to see what pushed the precious metals higher as gold posted a new all-time high last Friday at $1985, just shy of the next thousand. The silver price more than doubled since its severe crash in March. Indeed, the precious metals "volcano" awoke erupting its power on fiat, which has been printed heavily. I warned about this trigger in my April post called "Gold Could Fly Over A Helicopter Throwing Money". More than three months have passed since then, why "volcano" erupted only now?
Among the reasons, an escalating trade war and the COVID-19 pandemics. It's all about the relationship between the two largest economies and the health of each of them. US gross domestic product fell at an annualized rate of 33% in the second quarter, said the Commerce Department last Thursday. It's the largest fall on record dating back to the 1940s. The hope for a quick rebound is escaping as economists don't see the recovery to the prior peak until 2022. This contrasts with a V-shaped rebound of the Chinese economy, which showed 3.2% growth in the second quarter after a -6.8% crash in the first one. But that is not enough to restart the global economy as each player matters.
I guess the main driver for the sharp rally of the top metals was the smell of a possible cold war or even a real military collision between the US and China, that appeared recently. I hope it won't happen, but investors are hesitant to bet when this turmoil will end, so they rush to the safe-haven metals to wait through this uncertainty. At the same time, the US dollar index has been sold off dropping from its multi-decade peak at 104 that was hit in March down to the current 93 level. The nearest support is located at 88, the valley that was established in February of 2018. This leaves the room for the top metals to grow even more.
Let's get down to the updated charts, and the daily gold chart will be the first. Continue reading "Gold & Silver: The Volcano Awoke"