Gold Prices Move Moderately Higher After Seeing Early Weakness

(RTTNews) - After moving to the downside early in the session, the price of gold turned higher over the course of the trading day on Thursday.

The price of gold for February delivery climbed $8.30 or 0.5 percent to $1,814.10 an ounce after falling as low as $1,796.20 an ounce.

The turnaround by the price of the precious metal was partly attributed to a pullback by treasury yields, with the yield on the benchmark ten-year note giving back ground after ending the previous session at its highest closing level in over a month.

Gold prices moved higher despite a modest increase in the value of the U.S. dollar, as the U.S. dollar index is inching up by 0.2 percent.

In U.S. economic news, the Labor Department released a report unexpectedly showing a modest drop in first-time claims for U.S. unemployment benefits in the week ended December 25th.

The report said initial jobless claims dipped to 198,000, a decrease of 8,000 from the previous week's revised level of 206,000.

The slight pullback surprised economists, who had expected jobless claims to inch up to 208,000 from the 205,000 originally reported for the previous week.

A separate report from MNI Indicators growth in Chicago-area business activity picked back up in the month of December.

MNI Indicators said its Chicago business barometer rose to 63.1 in December from 61.8 in November, with a reading above 50 indicating growth. Economists had expected the business barometer to inch up to 62.0.