Pullback From Cycle Highs

Gold is ~$3/oz higher, printing $1,909.4/oz at writing. The precious metal has backed away from fresh eight-month highs made earlier in Asia-Pac dealing ($1,914.3/oz), with the early risk-off impulse from the latest developments surrounding the Russia-Ukraine situation edging away from extremes, despite a lack of fresh headline flow (perhaps a case of some market participants being hopeful that a Russia-backed separation of Luhansk & Donetsk from Ukraine will be the end game in the standoff, although the U.S. and some of its allies are not onboard with that train of thought).

• To recap, gold closed slightly higher on Monday after news that Russian President Putin had officially recognised the sovereignty of the aforementioned Ukrainian separatist regions, while ordering Russian troops into those territories to “keep the peace”. The move immediately drew condemnation from western leaders, seeing the U.S. and UK announce plans for Russian sanctions on Tuesday, with the EU to follow in the coming days.
• A reminder that U.S. Secretary of State Blinken and Russian FM Lavrov had previously agreed to meet in Geneva this Thursday, where details of a Biden-Putin summit (which had been agreed to in principle) were set to be discussed.
• Looking to technical levels, gold remains well clear of support at $1,853.9 (Jan 25 high), while key resistance at $1,916.6 (Jun 1 ’21 high and bull trigger) remains untested. A break above the latter would expose further resistance at $1,935.8/oz, the top of a bull channel drawn from the Aug 9 ’21 low.