Investing.com - Gold futures edged lower on Monday amid concerns that interest rates may rise sooner than markets once thought.
Loose monetary policies tend to bolster gold's appeal as a hedge to weaker currencies.
On the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange, gold futures for August delivery traded at 1,319.20 a troy ounce during U.S. trading, down 0.16%, up from a session low of $1,312.50 and off a high of $1,321.70.
The August contract settled down 0.77% at $1,320.60 on Thursday. Markets were closed on Friday for the U.S. Independence Day holiday.
Futures were likely to find support at $1,309.40 a troy ounce, Thursday's low, and resistance at $1,334.90, last Tuesday's high.
Gold prices continued to slump after the Department of Labor reported last week that non-farm payrolls rose by 288,000 in June, easily surpassing expectations for an increase of 212,000.
The dollar firmed on the news by stoking expectations for the Federal Reserve to hike interest rates.
However, by Monday trading after a holiday weekend in the U.S., profit takers wiped out the greenback's advance, though gold prices remained in negative territory amid uncertainty as to when the Fed will move.
Many investors jumped to the sidelines to await the release of the minutes from the Federal Reserve's June policy meeting, which may hold clues concerning the direction of monetary policy.
U.S. investment bank Goldman Sachs said it expected the Fed to raise interest rates in the third quarter of 2015 as opposed to the first quarter of 2016 made in an earlier prediction, though uncertainty ahead of the release of the Fed minutes on Wednesday steered investors away from the yellow metal.
Meanwhile, silver for September delivery was down 0.83% at $21.023 a troy ounce, while copper futures for September delivery were down 0.35% at $3.259 a pound.