Gold Holds Steady above $1225 Ahead of US-EU Trade Talks

The spot gold XAUUSD is currently trading at $1227.24 with 0.22% increase in value while U.S. gold futures for August delivery were at $1227.60 with 0.17% increase in value. The dollar index which measures the greenback against a basket of six major currencies is trading 0.10% lower at 94.514.

A meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker is set to be held in Washington later today, where the two leaders will discuss trade-related issues. This comes after the United States imposed tariffs on EU steel and aluminum in June and Trump threatened to extend them to EU cars and car parts. Investors are also awaiting the second-quarter U.S. economic growth data which is due on Friday, where they expect growth to top current forecasts of 4.1%. This situation has caused investors to take up cautious stance despite rising in U.S Treasury yields which helped USD bulls earlier this week as traders await further headlines before making serious bets and long-term trade orders.

Silver remains relatively unchanged over US Dollar’s fluctuating price action in recent past and present trading sessions. Spot silver XAGUSD has been trading around $15.34 to $15.54 price handles for the past 6 consecutive trading session with this week seeing the pair trapped inside even smaller price band of $15.54 to $15.44 price range, the pair is currently trading at $15.52 with 0.34% increase in value. Both gold and silver are expected to trade inside their wider price band limits during this week’s trading session with price band for gold at $1215-$1235 price handles.

Oil prices rise after API Reports Inventory draw across the board. The American Petroleum Institute (API) reported a crude oil draw of 3.16 million barrels of United States crude oil inventories for the week ending July 21, compared to analyst expectations that this week would see a smaller draw in crude oil inventories of 2.331 million barrels. Last week, the American Petroleum Institute (API) reported a surprise build of 629,000 barrels of crude oil.

Crude oil prices are trading up today as tensions continued to escalate between Iran and the United States and as IMF’s prediction that Venezuela would see a million-percent inflation rate this year, making any oil production increases that Venezuela may have had its sights set on seem like a rather lofty goal as PDVSA employees struggle to make ends meet. The U.S. Energy Information Administration report on crude oil inventories is due later today. WTIUSD is currently trading at $70.10 per barrel with a 0.05% increase in value.