Silver Price News: Silver Pulls Back from One-Month High

Silver prices took a hit on Thursday, sending the grey metal back down to levels seen at the start of the week.

Prices fell as low as $28.82 an ounce on Thursday, compared with around $29.60 an ounce in late deals on Wednesday. The drop comes in the context of a one-month high of $30.00 an ounce seen on Tuesday.

Silver’s moderate losses were in line with weakness in the gold markets on Thursday, which came as the US dollar rebounded from Wednesday’s lows.

Monthly manufacturing data for several major economies around the world released on Thursday came in slightly below market expectations in most cases, sending a negative signal for industrial demand for silver.

On the technical charts, silver’s recent move higher to $30.00 an ounce has been keenly watched, not just because of being a psychological number, but also because this level represents the upper boundary of a declining price channel going back as far as late May. Thursday’s price drop will be seen as reaffirming that downward trend for the time being.

Elsewhere, attention will be on monetary policy once again on Friday, with central bankers set to gather at the Jackson Hole Symposium in Wyoming on Friday and Saturday. 

US Fed Chair Jerome Powell is set to make a keynote speech during the event on Friday. His comments will be closely watched for signs that the central bank may see inflation coming down enough to justify an interest rate cut in September, and whether this could be as large as a 50-basis point cut.

Lower interest rates tend to support precious metals prices, and the markets have been betting on cuts of up to 100 basis points in total by the US Fed before the end of the year.