Silver Price Analysis: XAG/USD drops amid USD strength, poised for a weekly decline

• XAG/USD retreated below the $24.70 level, poised to close a more than 1% weekly loss.
• USD gained some ground following lower-thank expected unemployment figures on Thursday.
• All eyes on next week’s Fed decision.

At the end of the week, the XAG/USD lost ground and is set to close a weekly loss following three weeks of gains. The USD measured by the DXY index, is recovering and tallied a fourth consecutive day of gains jumping above 101.00 making the grey metal struggle to find demand.

The USD gained some ground following labour market data on Thursday, which fueled hawkish bets on the Federal Reserve (Fed) and a rise in US yields, weakening metal prices. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released unemployment data, showing a decrease in jobless claims to 228,000, below the expected 242,000. Investors are speculating on a hawkish stance from the Fed, anticipating the need to maintain higher interest rates for a longer period as the labour market remains robust.

In today’s session, US yields trade mixed across the board following Thursday’s increase. The 2-year yield jumped to 4.85%, seeing mild gains while the 5 and 10-year rates slightly decreased to 4.08% and 3.82%.

Regarding next week’s decision, markets are mainly discounting a 25 basis point (bps) hike, but the odds of a second week past July have increased following Jobless Claims data but still remain low at nearly 35%. In addition, markets will closely watch Jerome Powell’s presser to look for clues regarding forward guidance.

XAG/USD Levels to watch

According to the daily chart, the technical outlook is starting to turn bearish for the short term as bulls are losing steam. The Relative Strength Index (RSI) got rejected at the overbought threshold on Wednesday, prints and points south, while the Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD) prints decreasing green bars.

Support levels: $24.60, $24.50, $24.10.
Resistance levels: $25.00, $25.30,$25.00.

XAG/USD Daily chart