Commodities saw rather calm session, waiting for an outcome of the Fed meeting. The Fed’s announcement that it anticipates very low rates through late 2014 supported the prices of commodities across the board (for more on the FOMC meeting click here).
Apart from the FOMC meeting, the market had to cope with another Iran’s threats. The Parliament’s energy committee spokesman said the country prepared a bill which, if approved, would stop exports of crude to Europe before the EU embargo took effect. Such a decision would have the most severe impact on debt-crisis-wounded countries, particularly on Greece, which imports about a third of its oil from Iran. Regarding the market impact, it would probably have a significant impact on the short-term contracts and the short-end of the futures forward curve would probably turn into a severe backwardation.
However, despite the flow of bullish news, Brent crude posted only small gains and currently is seen at 110.50 USD per barrel.
Precious Metals
Although the Fed’s decision bolstered the commodities prices across the board, the impact on precious metals prices has been the most apparent. The price of gold surged to the highest level in more than a month and breached 1700 USD per troy ounce.
Generally, low real interest rates environment has been historically favourable for the price of gold (see the chart). Therefore, prolonged period of stable low interest rates (perhaps through late 2014) could play in favour of the price of the yellow metal in months ahead.