Gold stretches slow recovery move for fourth straight session

Gold traded with a positive bias for the fourth consecutive session and stretched it's slow but steady recovery move from four-month lows touched at the start of this week.

Currently trading around $1223-24 region, the precious metal has been finding support from safe-haven demand amid political turmoil steaming out of Donald Trump Jr.'s release of emails revealing the Trump administration's alleged connection with Russia.

Adding to this, fading prospects for an aggressive Fed rate tightening cycle, following Wednesday's perceived dovish testimony by the Fed Chair Janet Yellen further reaffirmed by sliding US Treasury bond yields, was also seen driving flows towards the non-yielding yellow metal.

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Moreover, persistent US Dollar weakness, which tends to boost demand for dollar-denominated commodities, remained supportive of the metal's tepid recovery move back closer to weekly tops touched in the previous session.

Investors now look forward to Friday's important US macro data - monthly retail sales and the latest inflation figures, in order to determine the next leg of directional move for the commodity. In the meantime, today's release of weekly jobless claims and PPI print would be looked upon to grab some short-term trading opportunities.

Gold: See-saw ride in 2017 - NAB

Technical levels to watch

A follow-through buying interest beyond $1225-26 resistance, the recovery could get extended towards the very important 200-day SMA near $1230-31 region. A convincing move beyond the key 200-day SMA hurdle could trigger a short-covering rally towards $1242 strong horizontal resistance.

On the flip side, $1218 region now seems to protect the immediate downside, below which the commodity would turn vulnerable to head back towards multi-month lows support near $1205-04 region en-route $1200 round figure mark.