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(Wallace Refiners) – Gold and silver are trading higher on the last trading day of the week. It has been a rollercoaster of a week for the precious metals and now gold trades 0.43% higher overnight and 1% higher for the week.
After inheriting a negative close from Wall Street sentiment from overnight was poor. The Nikkei 225 (-1.41%), ASX (-0.56%) and Shanghai Composite (-1.69%) all traded in the red.
The dollar index is trading lower overnight as GBP and EUR push higher against the greenback. The best performer overnight has been NZD as NZD/USD moved 0.28% higher. In the rest of the commodities complex, WTI (1.19%) and copper (–0.28%) trade mixed. Palladium has started the session 2.26% lower after some massive moves up in recent sessions.
Overnight the BoJ did not change rates or QE as expected. BOJ’s Kuroda said he does not think current FX moves deviate from fundamentals. The BoJ also said they are not thinking about widening JGB yields band for now. Lastly, as rumoured the bank dropped the 6 tln yen ETF buy target, maintains 12tln yen ceiling. The BoJ said the bank committed to buying JPY 1.2bln of ETFs per day.
US officials say discussions with China were substantive, serious and direct. The US used the first session to outline its interests and priorities, heard the same from Chinese counterparts. US official says China grandstanding, public theatrics, dramatics over substance.
China’s Foreign Minister Yang also commented saying China firmly opposes US meddling in its internal affairs.
Overnight there was some data from Australia where retail sales (preliminary, February) fell -1.1% m/m (vs. expected +0.6%).
Germany, France and Italy to resume AstraZeneca rollout from Friday. This comes after the EMA said the positives far outweigh the negative effects.
Ford is cutting some production due to the chip shortage. We have reported that Ford are not the only nation to take this measure and it could have an impact of base metals usage.
Looking ahead to the rest of the session highlights include Canadian retail sales, US and China talks, quad witching, WHO AstraZeneca decision and comments from ECB’s Panetta.
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