Precious metals rode a bargain-hunting wave to begin the week and finished the day having regained some of the value lost during last week’s trading session. All in all, last week did not provide investors too much in the way of markets-moving economic data, but by Thursday and Friday, the market was abuzz with activity.

Something that faded in and out of the headlines last week and is still doing the same was pro-Democracy demonstrations currently taking place in Hong Kong. Though the protests remained mostly peaceful, the fact that they were taking place in the world’s financial capital brought some unrest to global equity markets. The protests have since calmed down a good bit, but are still catching the attention of investors from around the world.

Employment Report Handily Bests Market Expectations

For last week being as quiet as it was, it still played host to some fairly important economic data from the United States. Apart from the European Central Bank meeting on Thursday, which offered no changes to EU monetary policy, the market was very interested in Friday’s release of the most recent employment data from the United States.

With every investor from around the world concerned about where the United States Federal Reserve is heading with monetary policy, any and all economic data from the United States will be hawked over with an absurd amount of scrutiny. In the lead-up to Friday’s data release, most experts and investors were expecting to see US job growth in September reach the 215,000 new job mark. What really happened, however, is that the data showed an increase in non-farm payrolls by nearly 250,000. This number, which handily beat the expectations of most experts, almost instantly caused the value of the USD to spike. What’s more, it also pulled US equities up from the slump they were in for most of last week. Though both markets are suffering a bit today, it is clear to see that most investors are bullish on most asset classes other than precious metals. As this quiet week wears on, I would be surprised to see the value of precious metals stay where they are at right now. The fact of the matter is that we are in the midst of a bearish market and the buying interest in gold and silver is limited to say the least.