YEREVAN, May 17. /ARKA/. On Wednesday, May 16, quotes for precious metals shrank due to unchanged concerns around the euro zone’s debt crisis and strong U.S. dollar. Gold and silver prices tumbled to the minimum benchmarks: gold to 1,527.04 USD, and silver- 26.766 USD per troy ounce.

European politicians are still not sure if Greece should stay within the euro zone. Greece is to face new elections after it failed to form a coalition government. However, the country may lose financial support from the international community. Thus, investors, concerned about possible outcomes of such scenario, preferred buying U.S. dollar rather than euro, pushing the quotes to fall.

Nevertheless, the precious metals could recover their losses due to successful auction of French and German bonds. Reduced yield of Spanish debt commitments also fostered rise in risky assets’ quotes. Also the U.S. Federal Reserve’s protocol released from the last session didn’t state any decisions to undertake new measures on economy stimulation.

As a result, gold prices slightly dropped to 1,542.83 USD per troy ounce, and silver lost 1.21% reaching 27.326 USD per troy ounce.

On Thursday, during the Asian trading session the prices for precious metals climbed due to cautious purchases and stabilization of the main currency pair. Nevertheless, the quotes remain non-stable because of the concerns around Greece.

The quotes for precious metals will mainly depend on U.S. dollar’s dynamics. If it continues growing the quotes will go down. U.S. macroeconomic statistics, particularly the number of initial unemployment allowance applications per week, and May manufacturing activity index from Philadelphia Federal Reserve may also impact the prices.

If the forecasts are justified, and the USA issues positive data, quotes may increase. Anticipated fluctuation range of gold on Thursday may be 1,533.0 – 1,565.0 USD per troy ounce, and silver- 27.00-28.16 USD per troy ounce.

Mikael Verdyan, an analyst at FOREX CLUB, specially for ARKA news agency.
The opinion of the author does not necessarily reflect that of the agency.—0–