Gold prices gained in Asia Friday on a rebound after an overnight decline on specualtion that U.S. rate hikes will take place around the first half of 2015 based on comments Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen made on Wednesday.
On the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange, gold futures for April delivery traded at $1,332.90 a troy ounce, up 0.18%, after hitting an overnight session low of $1,321.10 and off a high of $1,335.00.
The Fed is currently buying $55 billion in Treasury and mortgage debt a month, and expectations for the monetary authority to taper that figure gradually and close the program by fall followed by rate hikes in 2015 strengthened the dollar against gold.
The Department of Labor reported that the number of people filing for initial jobless benefits in the week ending March 15 rose by 5,000 to 320,000 from the previous week’s total of 315,000. Analysts had expected jobless claims to rise by 10,000 last week.
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