WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Gold prices held little changed near record levels on Friday as investors await the release of all-important U.S. jobs report later in the day for additional clues on the Fed's rate trajectory.
Spot gold was up 0.1 percent at $2,658.52 per ounce while U.S. gold futures were marginally lower at $2,678.20.
Economists currently expect the report to show employment rose by 140,000 jobs in September after an increase of 142,000 jobs in August. The unemployment rate is expected to hold at 4.2 percent.
CME Group's FedWatch Tool currently indicates a 65.4 percent chance the Fed will lower rates by a quarter point and a 34.6 percent chance of another half point rate cut in November.
The dollar was poised for its largest weekly gain since April due to safe-haven demand sparked by fears of escalating tensions in the Middle East.
Israel carried out a series of massive airstrikes overnight in the southern suburbs of Beirut and another that cut off the main border crossing between Lebanon and Syria.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said today that the U.S. and its allies were preserving the security of Israel to make it an energy exporting gate from the region to the West, but that the resistance in the region would not back down against Israel.
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