LONDON: Gold prices edged up on Wednesday, drawing some support from political uncertainty in the United States before a major central banking conference there this week.

Spot gold was up 0.3 per cent to $1,287.83 an ounce at 1414 GMT, after shedding 0.5pc in the previous session.

US gold futures were up 0.2pc to $1,293.20 per ounce. “Gold’s kind of hanging in there before this Jackson Hole meeting. It is in a wait-and-see mode but we should have a better idea of direction by the end of this week,” Fawad Razaqzada, a technical analyst at FOREX.com, said.

“There can be an argument made for a bearish view on gold at this stage. If the dollar were to come back due to short covering and given the rally in US stocks we saw yesterday, the (dollar) buck-denominated and safe haven metal could fall out of favour,” he said.

Silver rose 0.2pc to $17 an ounce, while platinum was up 0.4pc to $975. Palladium lost 0.1pc to $932 after touching an over 16-year high at $940 on Tuesday.

Markets are turning their focus to a meeting of central bankers in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, later in the week where Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen and European Central Bank chief Mario Draghi are set to deliver speeches on the outlook for monetary policy and interest rates.

Gold is highly sensitive to rising US interest rates, as these increase the opportunity cost of holding non-yielding bullion, while boosting the dollar, in which it is priced.

Published in Dawn, August 24th, 2017