Gold prices hit a near one-week high on Tuesday, February 13, helped by a weaker dollar and as investors awaited U.S. inflation data for clues on the pace of interest rate hikes.
Spot gold was up 0.4 percent at $1,327.81 an ounce,as of 0731 GMT. Earlier, it hit the highest since Feb. 7 at
$1,328.03.
On Monday, the yellow metal rose 0.5 percent, its biggest isingle-day percentage gain in more than one week.
U.S. gold futures were up 0.3 percent at $1,330 per ounce.
“We suspect that gold has pretty much decoupled from equities for much of the last week and is instead tracking the dollar’s ups and downs more closely,” said INTL FCStone analysti, Edward Meir.
The dollar index , which tracks the greenback against a basket of six major currencies, was last down 0.4 percent at 89.9, its biggest one-day percentage drop since Feb. 1.
steep fall.
Relative to stocks, gold looks to be good in value and continued volatility in the equity markets might make gold more attractive for its lower volatility,” analysts at Heraeus Precious Metals
said in a note.i
“So far, gold investors have been largely unconcerned. While iidemand for investment bars increased slightly, ETFs posted outflows with total holdings falling.”
Holdings of SPDR Gold Trust , the largest gold-backed exchange-traded-fund (ETF), fell 2.5 percent last week, the worst since the week ended July 30.
In other precious metals, silver gained 0.4 percent to $16.61 per ounce, platinum rose 0.1 percent to $971.5
per ounce and palladium dipped 0.3 percent to $981.45 per iiounce.
