Gold dips, heading for weekly loss

Gold eased yesterday ahead of US jobs data expected to boost confidence in the world’s largest economy and strengthen the case for the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates after buoyant factory data the previous day. Bullion is highly sensitive to rising interest rates, which make the nonyielding asset less attractive while boosting the dollar, in which it is priced.

Spot gold edged 0.1 percent lower to $1,169.66 an ounce by 1138 GMT. The metal fell to its lowest since Feb. 5 at $1,160.38 in the previous session and is on track for its fourth straight week of losses. US gold futures gained 0.2 percent to $1,171.60. Capital Economics commodities economist Simona Gambarini said that a December rate rise has already been factored in to gold prices and that US president-elect Donald Trump is uppermost in investors’ minds.

“Most investors are now looking at 2017 to see what’s going to happen with Trump, what policies he will implement and the inflationary impact of those policies.” The dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of major currencies, slipped by about 0.1 percent. — Reuters