Gold slips on strong dollar, Fed rate hike comments

Gold prices eased on Friday after touching their lowest in over five months the session before, dragged down by a stronger US dollar and after Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen bolstered the case for raising interest rates next month. * Spot gold XAU= had slipped 0.2 percent to $1,213.75 an ounce by 0036 GMT. In the previous session, it marked its lowest since June 3 at $1,210.73, remaining on track for its second straight weekly decline. * US gold futures GCcv1 were down 0.3 percent at $1,213.40 per ounce. * The dollar rose to a 13-1/2-year high against a basket of currencies .DXY on Thursday as the bond market resumed its sell-off on growing certainty of a US interest rate increase in December. [USD/] * The election of Donald Trump as US president has done nothing to change the Fed’s plans for a rate increase “relatively soon”, the Fed’s Yellen said on Thursday in Congressional testimony. * US consumer prices recorded their biggest increase in six months in October on rising gasoline costs and rents. * The US economy is on track to grow at a 3.6 percent annualised pace in the fourth quarter after data showed domestic housing starts hit a nine-year high in October, the Atlanta Fed’s GDP Now forecast model showed on Thursday. * European Central Bank interest rates may be close to bottoming out but it is still premature to talk about reducing economic stimulus given the risk of acting too early, said ECB Executive Board member Yves Mersch. * The Bank of Japan on Thursday fired a warning shot to markets by offering to buy unlimited bonds for the first time under a revamped policy framework, as domestic debt yields surged in the wake of Trump’s upset US election victory. * SPDR Gold Trust (GLD), the world’s largest gold-backed exchange-traded fund, said its holdings fell 0.61 percent to 920.63 tonnes on Thursday from 926.26 tonnes on Wednesday. Source: The Himlayan Times