Gold shows moderate rise amid weakening dollar

Gold prices rose moderately on February 16 morning, buoyed by the weakening dollar, Report informs referring to the auction data.

The price of April gold futures on the New York Comex exchange rose by $4.3, or 0.23%, to $1,849.6 per troy ounce. March silver futures rose 0.83% to $21.75 an ounce.

The dollar index (the exchange rate against a basket of currencies of six US trading partners) fell by 0.26% to 103.65 points. The depreciation of the dollar supports the demand for gold, making it more affordable to buy in another currency.

The weakening of the US currency is associated with corrective dynamics after the previous growth on strong macro statistics. Retail sales in the US in January rose by 3% compared to December. Analysts expected growth of only 1.8%. As a result, the dollar index strengthened by 0.7% on February 15.