Gold Flat After Last Week's Recovery

(RTTNews) - The price of gold was little changed Monday morning, with the US dollar trading steady versus a basket of currencies ahead of this week's macroeconomic data out the world's largest economy

Gold for February delivery, the most actively traded contract, edged down $1.70 to $1,236.90 an ounce. Last week, gold gained just over 2 percent on bargain hunting after recording its worst annual performance in over twelve years in 2013.

Technical analyst opine that gold may stabilize after 'a double bottom' at around $1,200 an ounce.

Holdings of SPDR Gold Trust, the world's largest gold-backed exchange-traded fund, were unchanged at 794.62 tons.

This morning, the U.S. dollar was hovering near its one-month high versus the euro and the Swiss franc, while trading around a 2-week high versus sterling and a 5-year high against the yen.

In economic news from the euro zone, German private sector growth slowed more than estimated initially in December, detailed results of a survey by Markit Economics showed. The headline composite output index, that measures combined performance of the country's manufacturing and services industries, fell to 55 in December from 55.4 in November.

Euro zone investor confidence improved sharply in January to the highest since April 2011, a monthly survey by the think tank Sentix showed. The sentiment index rose by 3.9 points to 11.9 in January. In Germany, investor sentiment rose to 32.4 in January from 32.1 a month ago.

Meanwhile, euro zone's private sector growth accelerated as estimated in December, supported by strong performance by the manufacturing sector, final data released by Markit Economics revealed. The seasonally adjusted composite output index, which measures performance of manufacturing and service sectors, rose to a three-month high of 52.1 in December from 51.7 in November. The outcome matched the flash estimates

The prices of silver and platinum were ticking lower in morning deals.

From the U.S, the Commerce Department will release its factory orders report for November at 10 am ET. Economists expect factory orders to have increased by 1.6 percent month-over-month following a 0.9 percent drop in October.

Simultaneously. the Institute for Supply Management is due to release the results of its non-manufacturing survey for December. The consensus estimates call for an improvement in the index to 54.8 in the month from 53.9 in November.