Good morning, traders; welcome to our market week preview, where we look at the economic data, market news, and headlines likely to have the biggest impact on the price of gold this week and beyond, as well as other key correlated assets.
Gold prices are moderately higher this morning to start the holiday-shortened week, having risen above the key $1800/oz level.
The driver for gold’s climb this morning appears to be a rally across the broader commodities complex that has come as China continues to roll back some of its tightest Covid restrictions. We’ll keep an eye on how this might continue to impact gold prices through the week since—as is always the case in this nether week between Christmas and the new year—there will be precious little else to trade on.
US Economic Data to Watch
Thursday, December 29 at 830am EST // Initial Jobless Claims
[consensus est.: +225K // prev.: +216K]
The weekly tab of new unemployment claims has risen and re-settled back around 220,000/week here at the end of 2022, and while that’s still elevated from a historical perspective, investors don’t seem particularly worried about it given the persistent strength of the more important labor market data that updates monthly. We’ll keep an eye on it this week for any potential to make the gold chart more volatile, given that it’s the only show in town and market depth for the yellow metal will certainly be very thin come Thursday.
Friday, December 30 at 945am EST // Chicago PMI
[consensus est.: 40.0 // prev.: 37.2]
Here we are, the last data point of 2022. The consensus is looking for a rebound in what has been a steadily declining survey of business activity expansion in the US since May, thanks largely to the loosening of Covid constrictions in China that we see continuing to benefit gold prices today. The reaction to a positive, as-expected report is hard to anticipate for gold but generally could weaken the metal’s position, as it may either be read by the few traders in town as a wave-on for the Fed to continue raising rates aggressively in February.
And that’s how the week lays out ahead of us, traders. As always, I wish you all the very best of luck in your markets in the coming days, and I’ll look forward to seeing you all back here on Friday for our market-week wrap-up.