• Gold’s recovery capped by the $1,820 area, stays under pressure.
• Improvement in risk sentiment offers limited help to the yellow metal.
• On a weekly basis, XAU/USD is down almost 4%.

Gold bottomed at $1,799 on Friday, the lowest level since February. A recovery followed later that found resistance quickly at $1,820. The yellow metal remains under pressure.

Some risk returns, not for gold

Wall Street is rising sharply on Friday, on a recovery rally. Also, crude oil prices are printing important gains. US yields remain steady and the dollar is correcting lower. Usually, that environment should be positive for gold. It only helped the metal stay above $1,800.

On the contrary, Silver is staging a recovery back to the 21.00 area and is positive on Friday up 1.50%, while on a weekly basis it is down almost 6%, about to post the lowest close since July 2020.

Both metals remain under pressure in the current environment of higher interest rate, a weaker growth outlook and financial tensions. The technical perspective offers no improvement as the only positive is the extreme oversold readings in technical indicators. There is no sign of a rebound or a consolidation yet.

Gold is about to post a weekly decline of almost 4%, the second worst performance of the year and a close below the 20-week moving average, for the first time since January.

“A prolonged weakening of the dollar doesn’t look likely in the current market environment. The factors that have been driving the greenback’s valuation, namely the ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict, heightened inflation fears amid lockdowns in China and the Fed’s tightening prospects, should remain intact next week. Hence, it would be reasonable to expect that gold’s recovery attempts are likely to remain limited in the short term”, explained Eren Sengezer, analyst at FXStreet.

Technical levels