Silver rises as US / USD bond yields decline following FOMC “dovish” Minutes

• Silver has risen from the lows reached in the Asian session below $ 25.00 to $ 25.50.
• A softer USD and lower US bond yields in the wake of Wednesday’s “dovish” FOMC Minutes are boosting precious metals.

Silver Spot Prices (XAG / USD) They have been at the forefront for most of the session thus far, rising from the Asian session lows below $ 25.00 to current levels above $ 25.50. That means the precious metal has managed to break above its 21-day moving average, which currently sits at $ 25.39, and is trading higher by about 1.7% or more than 40 cents on the day.

Now that the precious metal has managed to break above the key resistance area at around $ 25.40 (which contained the 21 DMA, March 12 and 22 lows and March 24 high), the short-term technical bulls will be on. Watching for an eventual move back to the 50 DMA, which is currently trading above $ 26.20. The main resistance level to watch out for before the 50 DMA is a support area that turned into resistance around $ 25.80.

Performance of the day

The US dollar is declining modestly (DXY currently falling towards the 92.00 level) and US government bond yields are falling (the 10-year yield is currently trading around 1.63%, just over 2 basis points in the session. ), a bullish combination for precious metal markets, hence why silver is trading higher. As for why the dollar is softer and yields lower, market commentators refer to the release of the FOMC Minutes on Wednesday.

In terms of other drivers of risk sentiment on the day; The latest weekly US jobless claims figures weren’t very good, with initial weekly jobless claims rising to 744,000 from 719,000 last week (versus forecast for a drop to 680,000) and continuing claims coming in to 3,734M compared to forecasts of a drop to 3.65M. Elsewhere, while there are still some concerns about the rising rate of Covid-19 infection in the US, the picture still looks rosy there with the director of the US Center for Disease Control. , Walensky, saying that everyone over the age of 12 should get vaccinated in May. Meanwhile, reports in the UK suggest that the country should reach the herd immunity threshold by Monday. That means the US and UK will be the first two major countries to achieve herd immunity, and markets will be watching to see what impact this has on the pandemic (expectations will likely be that infections will increase as both countries reopen, but hospitalization and death rates remain much lower than in the past).

Technical levels