Gold steadied on Thursday in Asian trade as a rally in the US dollar showed signs of fatigue after the currency hit its highest in nearly 14 years against a basket of currencies the day before. Spot gold was up 0.1 percent at $1,226.26 an ounce at 0455 GMT, after dropping 0.25 percent in the previous session.
US gold futures rose 0.15 percent to $1,225.70 an ounce. The dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of major currencies, slipped 0.13 percent to 100.280, as moderate US inflation data drove a flattening of the US Treasury yield curve. "The dollar was higher and gold was sold. Now, the dollar has given away gains and gold is steady," said Yuichi Ikemizu, head of commodity trading at Standard Bank in Tokyo.
"It has found a bottom around $1,220 and looks firm." Gold is highly sensitive to interest rates. Spot gold has failed to break resistance at $1,235 per ounce and may consolidate below this level, which is above support at $1,210 for one or more days, according to Reuters technical analyst Wang Tao. SPDR Gold Trust, the world's largest gold-backed exchange-traded fund, said its holdings fell 0.13 percent to 926.26 tonnes on Wednesday.