Gold Spot Price Open: $1,295

Gold Spot Price Close: $1,302

Change in Gold Spot Price: +$7

Silver Spot Price Open: $20.40

Silver Spot Price Close: $20.54

Change in Silver Spot Price: +$0.14

Gold and silver performed well for yet another trading session  on Thursday, despite a lack of any real, noteworthy economic developments. When all was said and done, gold gained about 7 dollars while silver picked up roughly 14 cents.

Thursday was a quiet day on the trading bloc, keeping in line with how most other days this week have gone. Gold and silver were able to make gains today despite a rally being made by US equities. This is the second consecutive day equities in the United States have performed well, but most experts are still wary of American stocks. The real take-away from today is the impressive fact that gold was able to make gains directly in the face of US stocks. Normally, when stocks perform as well as they have the last few days a lot of downward pressure is placed on precious metals.

One factor that might have aided precious metals slightly was a weaker US retail sales report for January. In addition to retail sales being down, the weekly jobless claims report showed an increased amount of people seeking unemployment benefits. These two reports do little in the way of altering the recently poor outlook on the US economy. In fact, the first quarter of 2014 has been wholly disappointing from an economic data standpoint thus far, a fact that has many experts and investors convinced that the Fed will not taper QE further at their upcoming meeting.

As we bring this week to a close and look ahead to next week, all eyes will be on world stock indexes as their recent performance has been a cause for concern. Should US stocks do what the experts think they will and decline from today and yesterday’s gains, gold and silver may see even more gains come their way.