24.09.202118:28:00UTC+00Gold Futures Settle Slightly Higher

Gold futures settled higher on Friday as concerns about the possible impact of Chinese real estate major Evergrande's debt woes on the global financial market triggered some interest in the safe-haven yellow metal.

A weak dollar too contributed to gold's uptick. The dollar index which was hovering around 93.10 in the Asian session, recovered subsequently, and was last seen at 93.30, down 0.17% from Thursday's close.

Gold futures for December ended with a gain of $1.90 or about 0.1% at $1,751.70 an ounce. Gold futures gained a slender $0.30 in the week.

Silver futures for December ended lower by $0.254 at $22.425 an ounce, while Copper futures for December settled at $4.2855 per pound, up $0.0545 from the previous close.

The Federal Reserve said while releasing its monetary policy on Wednesday that it would likely start tapering its bond-buying program before the end of this year.

The Fed also hinted at hiking interst rate in 2022, and signaled a series of hikes over the next two years as well.

On Thursday, the Bank of England left its key policy rates and QE unchanged, but opined that the recent price developments appeared to have strengthened the case for a modest tightening of monetary policy.

In economic news today, a report released by the Commerce Department showed new home sales unexpectedly jumped by 1.5% to an annual rate or 740,000 in August after spiking by 6.4% to an upwardly revised rate of 729,000 in July.

Economists had expected new home sales to slump by 1.1% to a rate of 700,000 from the 708,000 originally reported for the previous month.

With the unexpected increase, new home sales continued to recover after tumbling to their lowest level in over a year in June.