Gold Up, Dollar Near Two-Year High as Fed Minutes Maintain Hawkish Stance
2022.04.07 09:15
By Gina Lee
Investing.com – Gold was up on Thursday morning in Asia, while the dollar remained near a two-year high after the U.S. Federal Reserve maintained its hawkish stance in the minutes from its latest meeting.
Gold futures inched up 0.01% to $1,923.30 by 1:54 PM ET (5:54 AM GMT). The dollar, which normally moves inversely to gold, inched down but near a two-year high on Thursday.
The benchmark U.S. 10-year Treasury yield was close to the multi-year highs hit in the previous session.
The Fed released the minutes from its March 2022 meeting on Wednesday, which indicated that the central bank is preparing to move aggressively to curb high inflation.
“Many” policymakers said they were prepared to hike interest rates in half-percentage-point increments at incoming policy meetings, even as the risks stemming from the war in Ukraine held them to the standard 0.25% hike in March.
The European Central Bank will also release the minutes from its meeting later in the day. Although expected to espouse a less hawkish tone than the Fed, the ECB is another central bank attempting to strike the right balance to curb inflation without entering a recession.
In Asia Pacific, the Reserve Bank of India will also hand down its policy decision on Friday.
Meanwhile, the Perth Mint said in a blog post on Wednesday that sales of gold products in March soared 68% to their highest in a year. The refiner attributed the increase to an increased appetite for the safe-haven yellow metal after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24.
In other precious metals, silver edged down 0.2% and platinum inched down 0.1%, while palladium gained 0.5%.
