Gold prices are modestly higher in early U.S. trading Wednesday, on more short covering and some backing and filling on the charts following recent selling pressure. The gold and silver bears remain in near-term technical control of their markets. April gold was last up $3.30 at $1,314.70 an ounce. Spot gold was last quoted up $1.40 at $1,313.75. May Comex silver last traded up $0.061 at $20.04 an ounce.

In overnight news, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis president James Bullard said the U.S. economy continues to improve and said he sees U.S. unemployment below 6% by the end of this year. Amid a lack of major headline economic data points so far this week, focus of the market place has been on world central banks and their monetary policies. European stocks rallied in part Wednesday on ideas the European Central Bank will soon embark on further monetary policy stimulus due to concerns about deflation. And recent downbeat economic data from China has the market place buzzing that China monetary officials could also loosen money policy to help stimulate the world’s second-largest economy. Traders and investors were caught off guard last week when the U.S. Federal Reserve issued a report that was deemed as less dovish than expected given that new Fed chair Janet Yellen is generally believed to be fully in the dovish camp on monetary policy.

U.S. economic data due out Wednesday includes the weekly MBA mortgage applications survey, the advance report on durable goods, the U.S. flash services PMI, and the weekly DOE energy stocks report.

Wyckoff’s Daily Risk Rating: 6.0 (The Ukraine situation has for the moment de-escalated but is still an unsettling market factor.)

(Wyckoff’s Daily Risk Rating is your way to quickly gauge investor risk appetite in the world market place each day. Each day I assess the “risk-on” or “risk-off” trader mentality in the market place with a numerical reading of 1 to 10, with 1 being least risk-averse (most risk-on) and 10 being the most risk-averse (risk-off), and 5 being neutral.

The London A.M. gold fix is $1,314.50 versus the P.M. fixing of $1,313.50.

Technically, gold futures bears have the overall near-term technical advantage. Bulls’ next upside near-term price breakout objective is to produce a close above technical resistance at $1,350.00. Bears' next near-term downside breakout price objective is closing prices below technical support at $1,300.00. First resistance is seen at Tuesday’s high of $1,318.00 and then at $1,325.00. First support is seen at the overnight low of $1,309.80 and then at this week’s low of $1,306.00.  

May silver futures bears have the near-term technical advantage. A four-week-old downtrend is in place on the daily bar chart. Silver bulls’ next upside price breakout objective is closing prices above solid technical resistance at $21.00 an ounce. The next downside price breakout objective for the bears is closing prices below solid technical support at $19.00. First resistance is seen at the overnight high of $20.145 and then at this week’s high of $20.315. Next support is seen at this week’s low of $19.905 and then at $19.75.

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