Gold held above $400 an ounce in Asia on Wednesday, but fresh buying was limited after gains in New York as investors awaited direction, traders said.
Spot gold was trading at $402.60/403.40 an ounce by 0430 GMT compared with $402.00/402.80 last quoted in New York.
"Physical buying in Hong Kong is rather slow after gold moved back to $400 level. We saw good demand at around $395 level," said one Hong Kong dealer.
COMEX gold rose about three dollars on Tuesday as investors sought safe-haven assets in a delayed reaction to last week's bombings in Madrid that killed 200 people.
Dealers expected gold to breach the $405 resistance this week.
"In a short-term, it looks like the market is still reasonably buoyant," said Martin Mayne, associate director at N M Rothschild in Sydney. "I think probably sometime within this week, we will see it move towards that $405 level."
Traders said they were keeping a close eye on major currencies for direction.
Gold struck a 15 year peak of $430.50 an ounce on January 6 as the euro surged, but a recovering dollar pushed it down to a 15 week low of $387.60 earlier this month.
The dollar was at a three-week low of 108.53 yen in the afternoon, but was little changed against the euro at $1.2280.
In Tokyo gold futures, the benchmark February 2005 gold contract on the Tokyo Commodity Exchange (TOCOM) fell seven yen per gram to 1,405 yen on the back of a strengthening Japanese currency. Silver was steady at $7.16/7.18 an ounce, platinum at $899/904 and sister metal palladium at $279/284.
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