FX:Gold trades near 8-week high as Greek talks remain in focus
Forexpros - Gold futures edged higher on Wednesday, trading near an eight-week high as investors continued to monitor talks between Greece and its bondholders and awaited key U.S. employment data later in the day.
On the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange, gold futures for April delivery traded at USD1,743.95 a troy ounce during early European morning trade, easing up 0.2%.
It earlier rose by as much as 0.3% to trade at a session high USD1,744.45 a troy ounce. Prices rallied to USD1,750.55 on Tuesday, the highest since December 8.
Futures were likely to find short-term support at USD1,719.15 a troy ounce, the low of January 30 and resistance at USD1,760.35, the high from December 8.
Meanwhile, euro-denominated gold futures rose to EUR1,331.95, the highest since September 19 and less than 3.5% away from the all-time high of EUR1,374.70.
Negotiations over a debt restructuring deal between Greece and its private creditors dragged on, showing no fresh signs of progress.
Greece and its international lenders, the European Union and the International Monetary Fund, have been in talks for weeks on a debt swap deal. An agreement is necessary for Greece to secure the next tranche of bailout funds in order to prevent a sovereign debt default.
Investors were also wary amid uncertainty over Portugal’s debt burden, as the yield on the country’s 10-year government bonds stood at 16.2%, fuelling concerns that Lisbon may need a debt restructuring deal.
According to U.K. lender Barclays, gold prices were expected to rise further as the fundamentals for strong gold prices have not changed.
"Gold's key pillars of support remain intact, ranging from central bank buying to negative interest rates and rising longer-term inflationary pressures supporting investment demand," the bank said in a report earlier.
Later in the day, the U.S. was to release data on non-farm employment change, as well as a report by the Institute for Supply Management on manufacturing activity to gauge the health of the U.S. economy and the need for further stimulus measures.
Elsewhere on the Comex, silver for March delivery rose 1% to trade at USD33.59 a troy ounce, while copper for March delivery gained 0.25% to trade at USD3.799 a pound.
Silver prices rallied nearly 16% in January, its biggest one-month gain since April 2011 when it surged to a record USD49.51 an ounce.
