With the last trading day of the month concluding we can look at the overall performance of individual assets in the precious metals complex. What we see is a break from the traditional correlation between gold and silver. While both of these precious metals had a stellar month, silver’s price gain dwarfed that of gold.

Today the Chinese commerce ministry spokesman Goa Feng said that his government would not respond to the latest tariffs imposed by our current administration. Goa Feng said, “Escalation of the trade war won’t benefit China, nor the U.S., nor the world.”

Although market participants continued to buy both physical gold and gold futures, today’s gains were not enough to overcome dollar strength. As of 4:30 PM EDT the dollar index is currently fixed at 98.165 after factoring in the gain of 0.258 points (+0.26%).

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Gold futures closed fractionally higher today, with the most active December contract currently up $0.70 and fixed at $1538.20 per ounce. Last night as gold traded overseas to a high of $1565 per ounce. This is the highest trading price gold has had not only this year but in the last six years.

On a day when many analysts expected Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell to be in the spotlight it was in an announcement by China that they would begin retaliatory tariffs against products they import from the United States, as well as tweets in response to the Chinese announcement by President Trump that sent the financial markets reeling in the United States.

Above all, the current monetary policy of the Federal Reserve as revealed by the minutes of last month’s FOMC meeting released yesterday lacks clarity. There is no clear picture of the current path of potential rate cuts by the Federal Reserve for the remainder of the year and the first quarter of 2020.

This afternoon at 2 PM EDT the Federal Reserve released the minutes from the July FOMC meeting which was held on the 30^th and 31^st of last month. From the perspective of analysts and market participants they were looking for any hint or indication of the current plans by the Federal Reserve to initiate more interest rate cuts later this year.

After trading sharply lower yesterday, gold futures have recovered after holding the key level of $1500 per ounce. Yesterday’s range took gold futures to a low of $1503.30. Today gold’s intraday low was $1503 per ounce before trading higher. As of 3 PM EDT the most active December Comex futures contract is up five dollars and fixed at $1516.60.

Gold futures basis the most active December contract have sold off sharply in trading today. As of 4:17 PM EDT gold futures are currently fixed at $1506 per ounce which is a net decline of $17.60 on the day. Dollar strength contributed to today’s decline with only a nominal percentage of the decline being attributable to gains in the dollar index.