Gold and silver have slipped lower leading into the EU session

RGold and silver have moved lower overnight and the yellow metal trades conclusively under the $1800//oz level. Silver dropped half a percent in the red to trade at $27.77/oz.

After inheriting a positive close from the US indices in the Asia-Pac area performed well overnight. The Nikkei 225 (1.67%), ASX (0.83%) and Shanghai Composite (0.59%) all closed higher.

Copper once again pushed higher last night to reach a high of $4.35/lb but it could not sustain that momentum and starts the EU session at $4.30/lb, Spot WTI also trades near its recent highs at $63.48/bbl.

ECB's Schnabel stated that the ECB will ensure that there is no unwarranted tightening of financing conditions. Fiscal and monetary policy support will remain crucial and must not be withdrawn prematurely.

Sticking with central bankers Fed Vice Chair Clarida says The Federal Reserve will not lift rates until we actually get to 2% inflation and maximum employment. He also added he does not see sustained upward pressure on inflation.

Overnight the Bank of Korea kept interest rates unchanged at 0.50%. This was a unanimous decision.

Anglo American reported their FY earings this morning: Revenue: $30.90B (est $29.96B), Adj EBITDA: $9.80B (est $9.41B), Adj EPS: $2.53 (est $2.20) and Net Debt: $5.58B (Full story to come on the main headline feed).

There was also some early data from German as the latest GfK Consumer Confidence reading for March hit -12.9 vs the expected reading of -14.0; prev -15.5 (prev -15.6).

There have been some reports that OPEC is considering boosting production by 500K barrels per day. In addition to this, Saudi Arabia could end its voluntary cut of 1mln barrels per day but the end of next month.

A Chinese Military Official has said a US navy warship sailed through the Taiwan Strait on February 24, China firmly opposes this action.

StatNews has reported that Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine performs as well in the real world as in clinical trials. The vaccine was 92% effective against severe Covid-19 after 2 doses.

Looking ahead to the rest of the session highlights include US core durable goods orders, US GDP, weekly initial jobless claims, US pending home sales and comments from ECB's Lance, de Guindos, Fed's Quarles, Bostic, Williams and RBNZ's Orr.

By Rajan Dhall

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