After recording sharp gains in the previous session, the price of gold was moving lower Friday morning amid a firm US dollar.
Gold for December delivery, the most actively traded contract, eased $4.60 to $1,281.70 an ounce. Yesterday, gold snapped a five-day loss to end sharply higher after Federal Reserve chairwoman-designate Janet Yellen said the U.S. central bank is in no hurry to taper down its quantitative easing program, even as some soft economic data filtered in.
Holdings of SPDR Gold Trust, the world's largest gold-backed exchange-traded fund, were unchanged at 865.71 tons.
Meanwhile, the U.S. dollar was extending gains versus the euro, sterling and the Swiss franc, while advancing toward a fresh 2-month high against the yen.
In economic news, euro zone inflation slowed to 0.7 percent in October, as initially estimated, from 1.1 percent in September, final data from Eurostat showed. The rate was the lowest since November 2009. Moreover, it has remained below the European Central Bank's target of 'below, but close to 2 percent' for the ninth month in a row. Month-on-month, consumer prices were down 0.1 percent in October, the statistical office said.
Meanwhile, the prices of silver and platinum were ticking lower in morning deals.
From the U.S., the Labor Department will release its report on export and import prices for October. Economists expect export prices to have increased by 0.2 percent month-over-month, while import prices are estimated to have declined by 0.5 percent.
The Federal Reserve is due to release its industrial production report for October at 9:15 am ET. The consensus estimates call for a 0.1 percent month-over-month increase in industrial output, while capacity utilization may have remained unchanged at 78.3 percent.
Later during the session, the Commerce Department is scheduled to release its wholesale inventories report for September. Economists expect the wholesale inventories to have increased by 0.4 percent month-over-month in September.
