LONDON, March 9: Gold gained ahead of US jobs data on Friday, but lagged behind other key financial markets as investors remained cautious after a heavy sell-off last week.

Gold is lagging the oil market and the base metals market because people are wary about paying too much for gold because the market is still very long, said David Holmes, director of precious metals sales at Dresdner Kleinwort.

They are reluctant to push it too much on the upside for fear of attracting profit-taking or further long liquidation.

The market feels fairly rangebound for the next week or so, perhaps within a bigger range. Spot gold rose as high as $653.90 an ounce and was at $653.00/654.00 up from $650.90/651.90 late in New York on Thursday, when it shrugged off a firmer dollar and hit an intraday high of $655.70.

Gold has rebounded as much as 3.7 per cent this week since hitting a six-week low of $632.30 on Tuesday, when risk-averse investors sold portfolio assets, including gold, to cover their losses following a surge in the yen and a fall in global stocks.

In contrast, copper prices rose more than seven per cent since Monday, while nickel gained nearly 10 per cent.

Frayed nerves have progressively improved during the course of the week and buyers have re-entered the markets, erasing the majority of the losses, said Investec Australia in a report.

Even if last week's sell-off does turn out to be just a correction; an important lesson should be drawn from last week's proceedings: When things go south they go south quickly.

Dealers said the jobs data might set gold's short-term pricetrend.

The payrolls data will be important in setting direction in financial markets until the next FOMC (Federal Open Market Committee) meeting on 21 March. A weak number should see the market sell equities and the US dollar, BNP Paribas said.

But we're not so sure that selling gold would be an equally good idea, it said in a report.

In other metals, silver edged up to $13.01/13.06 an ounce from $12.93/12.98 in New York, while platinum fell to $1,200/1,205 an ounce from $1,209/1,214. Palladium was flat at $350/355 an ounce.—Reuters