Over the weekend, Swiss voters rejected a referendum that would have required the Swiss central bank to hold 20% of its assets in gold.  While the referendum wasn’t expected to pass, its definitive rejection set a bearish tone to the week for gold.  Once crude oil started to plummet because of OPEC’s decision to maintain output in an oversupplied market, gold crumbled as well and made an intraday low of $1,142.50.

The dramatic sell-off was short lived though.  Moody’s cut Japan’s credit rating and US holiday spending slowed, fueling fear that global growth will stumble.  Then with crude oil reversing and causing shorts to scramble, gold ended up trading all the way back up to $1,222.50.  Gold traded in an $80 range and volume for the active February gold contract was over 34 million ounces.  Silver had an even wilder trading day than gold.  It had an intraday percentage move of nearly 19% from lows to highs.  Both gold and silver put in key reversals yesterday.  This means that they opened below the previous day’s close, made a new low, and then closed higher than the previous day’s high.  From a technical perspective, the key reversals are bullish.  Fundamentally, there are still some obstacles working against gold though.  The USD remains strong while crude oil is still weak.