XAG/USD soars follwoing Chair Powell’s press conference

• XAG/USD jumped towards $24.90, its highest in six days.
• The Fed delivered a 25 bps hike as expected, but Chair Powell didn’t commit to further hikes.
• USD weakness and falling US yields allowed the metal to gain ground

In the middle of the week, the XAG/USD pair is trading strong, showing 0.88% of gains so far this day. As the market expected, the Federal Reserve (Fed) effectively raised the interest rate by 25 basis points. Fed’s Chair Jerom Powell emphasized that “a rate hike in September is possible, but also stated that it is possible not to raise rates”. Powell also highlighted the importance of ‘meeting by meeting’ as the following decisions will be based on the data that comes out. 

Following this, US treasury yields on 2, 5 and 10-year bonds which could be seen as the opportunity cost of holding precious metals, are trading lower at 4.82%, 4.09% and 3.85%, respectively. Additionally, the DXY index is losing ground at 0.30% below 101.00. 

XAG/USD Levels to watch

According to the daily chart, there is a strong bullish momentum. The Relative Strength Index (RSI) with a slightly upward slope to the north, while the Moving Average Convergence Divergence  (MACD) index prints smooth green bars indicating a favourable momentum for the bulls in the market. On the bigger picture, the metal is trading above the  20,100 and 200-day Simple Moving Averages (SMA)suggesting that bulls are in command.

Resistance levels: 25.00, 25.30, 25.50
Support levels: 24.50, 23.98 (20-day SMA), 23.84 (100-day SMA).
 

XAG/USD Daily chart