Other precious metals, including silver and platinum, also gain By Polya Lesova, MarketWatch FRANKFURT (MarketWatch) -- Gold futures rose early Tuesday, as traders sold equities and the U.S. dollar and bought precious metals, including palladium and silver. Gold for December delivery, the most actively traded contract, advanced $8.60 to $1,255.70 an ounce in electronic trading on Globex. It earlier hit an intraday high of $1,256.40 an ounce. "The metal remains driven by technical and investment-related buying," said James Moore, an analyst at TheBullionDesk.com, in a note to clients. In Europe, most equity markets posted losses, with the Stoxx Europe 600 index (ST:SXXP 266.51, +0.06, +0.02%) dropping 0.3% in late morning trading. See story on European stocks U.S. stock futures pointed to a lower opening on Wall Street. In the currency markets, the dollar index (DXY 81.98, +0.07, +0.08%) , which tracks the performance of the greenback against a basket of other major currencies, slipped 0.2% to 81.763. Gold and the dollar typically have a strong inverse relationship; when the dollar falls, gold prices tend to gain and vice versa. The Japanese yen hit a 15-year high against the greenback, as Prime Minister Naoto Kan survived a challenge to his leadership of the ruling party, and the government. The dollar later recovered some ground to trade down 0.5% to 83.25 yen. Silver, palladium also gain Moore said that silver and palladium are leading the gains, adding that yen strength is boosting the platinum-group metals. "Silver is getting the double benefit of investor diversification and improving industrial demand," he also said. Silver for December delivery gained 23 cents, or 1.2%, to $20.39 an ounce. December palladium futures jumped 2.3% to $542 an ounce, as platinum also rose.

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