WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Gold futures settled slightly higher on Tuesday on safe-haven appeal and amid continued optimism about an interest rate cut by the Federal Reserve in June.
Gold prices rose sharply earlier in the session after the Fed's Chicago chief Austan Goolsbee said he sees three rate cuts this year.
Following the Fed announcement, the chances of a 25 basis point rate cut in June have rebounded to 63.7%, according to CME Group's FedWatch Tool.
However, the yellow metal's gain was just marginally, as the dollar recovered from early weakness and slowly moved above the flat line. The dollar index, which dropped to 104.01 in the European session, recovered to 104.34, gaining about 0.1%.
Gold futures for April ended up by $0.80 at $2,177.20 an ounce, coming off the day's high of $2,200.60 an ounce.
Silver futures for May ended down by $0.268 at $24.623 an ounce, while Copper futures for May settled at $4.0085 per pound, down $0.0075 from the previous close.
In U.S. economic news, the Commerce Department released a report this morning showing a notable increase in new orders for U.S. manufactured durable goods in the month of February.
The report said durable goods orders jumped by 1.4% in February after plummeting by a revised 6.9% in January. Economists had expected durable goods orders to shoot up by 1.3% compared to the 6.2% slump that had been reported for the previous month.
Orders for transportation equipment led the way higher, surging by 3.3% in February after plunging by 18.3% in January.
A report from the Conference Board showed a slight deterioration in U.S. consumer confidence in the month of March.
The report said its consumer confidence index slipped to 104.7 in March from a downwardly revised 104.8 in February. Economists had expected the consumer confidence index to come in unchanged compared to the 106.7 originally reported for the previous month.
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