Gold was steady after initially falling to a two-week low on Wednesday, as the dollar retreated from a one-month high, but the precious metal remained under pressure from expectations that a USS rate increase may come soon Spot gold was up 0.1 percent at $1,187.70 an ounce at 2:53 pm EDT (1853 GMT), after hitting $1,183.76 an ounce, the lowest since May 12. US gold futures for June delivery settled down $1.30 at $1,185.60.
Gold had dropped 1.7 percent on Tuesday after firmer US data supported the view that the US Federal Reserve may raise interest rates this year. "Gold got hit by a double whammy yesterday, first of all from the dollar move higher, which kicked off on Friday, but also speculative data which showed a 140 percent jump as of last Tuesday," Saxo Bank's head of commodity research Ole Hansen said.
"Today we have stabilised once again ahead of the 1170/80 band of support." Silver was down 0.3 percent at $16.66 an ounce, while platinum was down 0.7 percent at $1,115 an ounce and palladium was up 0.7 percent at $782.75 an ounce. Silver remains the best-performing precious metal this month despite Tuesday's 2.4 percent drop, up 3.2 percent since the end of April in its biggest monthly rise since January.