Gold and silver spot values are continuing to trend downward today, and things are not looking like they will get better anytime soon. Admittedly, the first two days of this week have been quite slow and most investors are simply holding their positions until a few economic happenings unfold on Thursday and Friday.

In case you missed it, the latter part of last week brought about a good deal of downward pressure for gold and silver. First, the FOMC concluded their meeting on Wednesday with a more hawkish post-meeting statement. In their statement, the Fed boasted about the US economy’s strength, and this led many investors to believe that interest rate hikes might be coming sooner rather than later. While this alone was enough to put a dent in precious metals spot values, the upbeat 3rd-quarter GDP released on Thursday only hurt the value of gold and silver further. Now, less than a week later, gold and silver spot values are both hovering near multi-year lows. It will be interesting to see if metals can find some relief in the coming days or if things will only grow worse as the week moves forward.

Crude Oil Prices Continue to Slump, Bring Metals Down Too

A feature in the global marketplace for the past few weeks has been the slumping nature of crude oil prices. Currently, crude oil is around $76/barrel, which marks the worst such position the commodity has seen in over two years. The downward-trending nature of crude oil spot values has brought down all raw commodities too, including precious metals. Not helping the prospects of gold and silver at all is the fact that, in addition to slumping oil prices, the US Dollar has been performing so well over the past few weeks.

When considering all of these factors, it really shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that gold and silver are doing poorly at present. Unfortunately, the European Central Bank meeting and the US employment data that is expected to be made public during the final days of this week are currently expected to only add more pressure on precious metals. As such, it will really be interesting to see how the duration of the week plays out and what it holds in store for gold and silver.