Gold prices are higher and scored a three-week high in early U.S. trading Monday. Safe-haven buying is featured to start the new trading week, as Russia-Ukraine tensions heated up during the weekend. June gold was last up $10.10 at $1,312.80 an ounce. Spot gold was last quoted up $11.60 at $1,312.75. July Comex silver last traded up $0.109 at $19.655 an ounce.

The Russia-Ukraine crisis has ratcheted up, which is not surprising. News reports said pro-Russian demonstrators on Sunday stormed a police station in Odessa, Ukraine, to free jailed comrades. This follows clashes on Friday and Saturday in parts of Ukraine that saw dozens of people killed. Gold and U.S. Treasuries are seeing safe-haven buying interest amid the heightened Russia-Ukraine tensions. U.S. stock indexes are weaker in the early going Monday, on some profit taking and amid the moderate “risk-off” trader and investor attitudes early this week.

Asian stock markets saw some selling pressure Monday following downbeat manufacturing data coming out of China, which has the world’s second-largest economy. The HSBC final purchasing managers’ index for China was 48.1 in April versus the preliminary reading of 48.3 and a reading of 48.0 in March. A number below 50.0 suggests contraction in the manufacturing sector.

In other news overnight, the European Union’s producer prices fell for the third month in a row in March—down 0.2% from February and down 1.6% from a year ago. The specter of price deflation is gripping the EU at present, which is likely to prompt the European Central Bank to soon announce some type of further monetary policy stimulus measures. The ECB holds its monthly monetary policy meeting on Thursday.

U.S. economic data due for release Monday includes the U.S. services PMI, the employment trends index, the global manufacturing PMI, and the ISM non-manufacturing report on business.

Wyckoff’s Daily Risk Rating: 7.0 (The Russia-Ukraine tensions are elevated.)

(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.

Technically, June gold futures bears have the slight overall near-term technical advantage but the bulls are making a move. Prices Friday scored a technically bullish weekly high close and saw follow-through strength on Monday. This gives the bulls upside momentum to suggest a near-term market low is in place. The gold bulls’ next upside near-term price breakout objective is to produce a close above solid technical resistance at the April high of $1,331.40. Bears' next near-term downside breakout price objective is closing prices below solid technical support at the April low of $1,268.40. First resistance is seen at the overnight high of $1,315.20 and then at $1,320.00. First support is seen at $1,300.00 and then at $1,310.00.  

July silver futures bears have the solid overall near-term technical advantage as prices hit a multi-month low last week. Prices are still in a nine-week-old downtrend on the daily bar chart. Silver bulls’ next upside price breakout objective is closing prices above solid technical resistance at $20.00 an ounce. The next downside price breakout objective for the bears is closing prices below solid technical support at last week’s low of $18.685. First resistance is seen at $19.93 and then at $20.00. Next support is seen at the overnight low of $19.485 and then at $19.25.

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