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Asian gold unchanged in afternoon, sentiment mixed

HONG KONG: Asian spot gold was little changed in quiet trading on Thursday afternoon and was expected to stay in a range awaiting developments to give it direction.

Gold bullion was quoted at US$287.60/288.10 per ounce late on Thursday compared to New York's previous close at US$287.50/288.50 on Wednesday.

"There was some small buying from the physical side, but dealers were selling," a trader said.

Referring to gold's brief short-covering rally this week, the trader said, "After the market was squeezed on weak shorts and closed around US$290, there was no follow-through and it came back down again," he said.

Physical demand was steady and gold found good support at US$286-7, a trader in Singapore said.

However, the outlook was for several weeks of featureless trading as gold failed to benefit from seemingly bullish factors, he said.

"The currency rates don't seem to affect it, oil prices don't seem to affect it, equities markets don't seem to affect it," he said.

Gold had rallied earlier despite Tuesday's auction by Britain which elicited a disappointing demand, but sentiment remained mixed because of concerns about future central bank sales, including by the Dutch and Swiss central banks.

Spot silver was quoted at US$5.11/14 an ounce after closing in New York at US$5.11/13 on Wednesday.

Local tael gold was quoted HK$13 down at HK$2,669.

The carry over charge at the Chinese Gold and Silver Exchange Society was -3.5, down from its previous fix at -3.-Reuters