Investing.com - Gold prices fluctuated Friday morning, gaining and and losing nine dollars an ounce during morning trading, as investors dissected the latest U.S. economic indicators.
The precious metal settled at 1179.20, or up 9.8, today.
The price of gold for delivery in February was at one point this morning up 0.7% at $1,177.70 a troy ounce, but also dropped as low as $1,168.40 per troy ounce.
The U.S. unemployment rate dropped to 4.6%, its lowest level in nearly a decade, while non-farm payrolls rose by 178,000. Economists had expected 180,000 new jobs and a jobless rate of 4.9% in November. There are still some 90 million Americans who are not in the U.S. workforce, however, due to structural changes over the last decade in the U.S. economy. President-elect Donald Trump has said that he believed, during the campaign this summer and fall, that unemployment in the U.S. was actually closer to 25% if those who are dispirited and no longer looking for a job, not retirees, were included in the unemployment figures. Backing up this line of analytical thinking is a figure from the unemployment report of this month that indicates more than 400,000 Americans dropped out of the labor force last month.
Earnings for private sector, non-government employees, also, surprisingly, declined last month in the U.S.
Many investors believe that today's new economic reports will prompt the Federal Reserve in Washington D.C. to tighten monetary policy. These expectations for higher interest rates have weighed heavily on gold, which competes with yield-bearing investments like bonds.