Gold climbs to near 1-month tops, above $1230 level

   •  USD weakens across the board on US-China trade truce and helped regain traction.
   •  Bullish traders seemed rather unaffected by a fresh wave of the global risk-on trade.
   •  Fed rate hike expectations fail to hinder the momentum ahead of US data/Fedspeaks.

Gold regained positive traction at the start of a new trading week and climbed to near one-month tops, just above the $1230 supply zone in the last hour.

The US Dollar weakened across the board on news that the US and China agreed not to impose additional trade tariffs for at least 90 days and was seen as one of the key factors benefitting the dollar-denominated commodity.

Meanwhile, bullish traders seemed rather unaffected by the prevalent risk-on mood, evident from strong gains across global equity markets, with the USD price dynamics turning out to be an exclusive driver of the precious metal's up-move.

It would now be interesting to see if the commodity is able to build on the positive momentum or runs out of steam at higher levels amid prospects for a gradual Fed monetary policy tightening cycle, which tends to drive flows away from the non-yielding yellow metal.

Moving ahead, today's speeches from influential FOMC members, along with the release of US ISM manufacturing PMI, a key highlight from today's US economic docket, will now be looked upon for some fresh impetus later during the early North-American session.

Technical levels to watch

Immediate resistance is now pegged near the $1235 level, above which the commodity is likely to accelerate the up-move further towards Nov. monthly swing highs, around the $1243-44 region. On the flip side, the $1227 horizontal zone now seems to act as an immediate support, which if broken might accelerate the fall back towards the $1221-20 region (daily lows).