Sitting on solid supply and demand fundamentals, palladium may have more room to grow even with the recent run-up in prices, this according to Phil Streible, senior market strategist at RJO Futures.
"There's no question on how high [palladium] could go because of the fact that there's limited supply and it's controlled by Russia and what little comes out of South Africa. With the new regulations on catalytic converters and fighting pollution, there's a true demand for palladium," Streible told Kitco News.
Palladium prices have been steadily climbing since August, surpassing gold in value earlier this year. Spot palladium last traded at $1,583 an ounce on Thursday.
On gold, Streible said that prices can start to trend higher now that the Federal Reserve has signaled a lack of intent to raise rates this year.
Wednesday saw the Fed announce a dovish stance, with a reduced growth forecast, sending bond yields lower, the dollar lower, and gold higher in response.
However, Streible noted that gold has not yet broken past its key resistance level.
"$1,325 [an ounce] is, I think, such a key level in the market. We saw a fail up there, $1,320 - that's also another level, but I really think $1,325, we break through there, I think there's a good shot that we move up to that next resistance point at $1,350," he said.
Streible said that what differentiates this gold rally from previous upswings following Fed meeting is the central bank's change of tone this time around.
"The Fed really changed its stance. If you look just back at last December, they were indicating three interest rate hikes in 2019, now that's come completely off the board," he said.
According to Streible, the Fed's dovish stance now puts an "invisible" support level on gold at $1,290 an ounce.
This article is commentary by an independent contributor. At the time of publication, the author held TK positions in the stocks mentioned.