WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Gold futures settled higher on Tuesday, although gains were just modest as investors continued to pick up equities amid easing worries about the impact of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus on global economic recovery.
The U.S. dollar remained fairly steady and U.S. Treasury yields rose amid rising expectations that the Federal Reserve could tighten policy more aggressively to tame inflation.
Comments by Fed officials suggest that the U.S. central bank is likely to decide to double the pace of its taper to $30 billion a month at its December meeting.
The dollar index, which climbed to 96.59 in early New York session, pared some gains subsequently and was up 96.43 nearly a couple of hours past noon. The dollar index had settled at 96.33 on Monday.
Gold futures for February ended up by $5.20 or about 0.3% at $1,784.70 an ounce, the highest settlement in nearly two weeks. Gold futures dropped to a low of $1,772.40 an ounce in the session.
Silver futures for March ended higher by $0.260 at $22.523 an ounce, while Copper futures for March settled at $4.3395 per pound, up $0.0020 from the previous close.
According to reports, experts are of the view that the new virus variant, with more than 30 mutations on its spike protein, may not be as dangerous as the Delta and Alpha and other variants of coronavirus.
British drug maker GlaxoSmithKline announced today that its antibody-based Covid-19 therapy, developed in collaboration with Vir Biotechnology in the United States, is effective against all mutations of Omicron.
Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX
© 2021 AFX News
