Two issues were on the front of everyone’s mind this week, one of which was in the United States and the other focused around the minuscule island nation of Cyprus. The US was dealing with the idea of weathering yet another Federal Reserve meeting while Cyprus is entrenched in one of the worst debt situations in Europe. As a whole neither story was strong enough to really sway precious metals to heavily in one direction or another.

Uneventful Fed Meeting

Whenever the Fed meets investors speculate, and this time was no different. Even though there was no reason for investors to think that monetary policy in the US was going to change many thought that it would. When the meeting happened the conclusion was that there is no need to change the current policy of Quantitative Easing quite yet.

While it may not last forever, QE is definitely going to be sticking around for the near future. This news was mildly positive for both gold and silver.

Cyprus Struggling to Keep Head Above Water

One of the many nations in Europe that are struggling to avoid falling into deep financial trouble is the small country of Cyprus. They are perhaps one of the most needy countries in all of Europe which prompted the IMF and the EU to draft up plans for a possible bailout. The first plan that was set forward included the taxing of all private bank accounts in Cyprus.

This news cause many Cypriots and those holding funds in Cypriot banks to withdraw all their money at once. Withdrawing all their money seemed like a good idea however after a while ATMs began to run out of cash. After most ATMs were left barren, the government of Cyprus declared a bank holiday which lasted the duration of the week.

Moving Ahead

When we look forward to next week, it is hard to imagine that there will be many people missing out on the conclusion of the crisis in Cyprus, Before this week Cyprus was just another European nation suffering from financial problems, but now that everyone has heard about this story it is unlikely that people will simply let it go.

Weekly Move

From the time the markets opened on Monday to the time they closed on Friday gold had moved from $1,598 to $1,609; a weekly gain of $11. Silver opened at $28.86 and stayed about the same by the time the week was over.