Precious Metals News Update - 24 April 2018

23 April 2018

COMMENTS / HIGHLIGHTS:

US 10 Yr Treasury yields nudged 3% overnight, propelling the US Dollar Index higher again which weighed upon US equities and precious metals values.
News from the US Treasury that sanctions relief would be provided to Rusal (the world’s largest aluminium producer ex-China) on condition of a restructuring of its ownership (whom the sanctions were targeted at), triggered a Skylab-esque reversion to the averages by the white metals, palladium in particular.

TECHNICAL COMMENTS:

XAU/USD: XAU/USD broke below minor trendline / moving average technical support at the USD 1332 level en-route to the low USD 1320’s yesterday. A quick glimpse at the Daily chart shows a market locked in a textbook sideways trading range which should continue to see the well delineated support and resistance levels respected for the present time.
XAU/AUD: XAU/AUD kicked marginally higher (predominantly on the move lower in the AUD/USD yesterday) but remained firmly entrenched within its recent sideways trading range with little to suggest from a technical perspective.
XAG/USD: XAG/USD dropped right back to where it started from last Tuesday, confirming that the move above significant trendline resistance (going back to July 2016) at the USD 17.20 level, was a false break and leaving the metal back within the non-descript trading range it had been traversing since the end of February.
XPD/USD: The news of the likely easing of sanctions against Rusal by the US government (mentioned above), put paid to any of the market indecision seen over the past two days as palladium specs abandoned ship, thereby reversing the better part of 6 days of upside price action. The rout halted just above the 21 Day moving average at USD 969 but it’s hard to see how further weakness will be avoided, as selling into any rally now seems probable.

XAU/XAG Ratio: Like silver, the break beneath the significant technical support line at 78.44 (which had been in place since the beginning of March last year) has proven to be a false break resulting from yesterday’s price action and as such, all downside technical targets are abandoned.

Good luck.

Regards,
Andre