2019.05.2815:40:00UTC+00Gold Futures Settle Lower As Dollar Advances

Gold prices drifted lower on Tuesday, as the U.S. dollar gained against most of its major rivals amid lingering concerns about U.S.-China trade dispute.

However, prospects of a reduction in U.S. interest rate, weakness in global stocks and concerns about Italy's budget deficit limited the yellow metal's decline.

The dollar index was up more than 0.3% at 97.96.

Gold futures for June ended down $6.50, or 0.5%, at $1,277.10 an ounce.

Silver futures for July ended down $0.235, at $14.320 an ounce, while Copper futures for July settled at $2.6960 per pound, losing $0.0035 in the session.

Trade worries continued to weigh on stocks as hopes of a U.S.-China trade agreement suffered a setback after U.S. President Donald Trump said on Monday that he was "not ready to make a deal with China" and it is likely that U.S. tariffs on goods from China "could go up very, very substantially, very easily".

In U.S. economic news today, a report released by the Conference Board showed another substantial improvement in U.S. consumer confidence in the month of May.

The Conference Board said its consumer confidence index surged up to 134.1 in May after jumping to 129.2 in April. Economists had expected the index to inch up to 129.8.

"Consumer Confidence posted another gain in May and is now back to levels seen last Fall when the Index was hovering near 18-year highs," said Lynn Franco, Senior Director of Economic Indicators at the Conference Board.

The bigger than expected spike by the headline index was partly due to a sharp increase by the present situation index, which shot up 175.2 in May from 169.0 in April.