Gold clings to modest daily gains, above $1290 level

   •  The prevalent USD selling bias helped regain positive traction on Monday.
   •  Fed rate hike pause speculations further underpin the non-yielding commodity.
   •  This week’s FOMC meeting minutes/Powell’s speech to provide a fresh directional impetus.

Gold regained positive traction at the start of a new trading week and recovered a major part of Friday's corrective slide from 6-1/2 month tops. 

The precious metal reversed an early dip to $1283 area, with a combination of factors helping build on Friday's late rebound from near one-week lows touched in the aftermath of blockbuster US monthly jobs report. 

The US Dollar failed to capitalize on the post-NFP uptick and remained on the defensive through the early European session on Monday, which eventually extended some support to the dollar-denominated commodity.

Despite Friday's stellar headline NFP print and stronger than expected wage growth data, the Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s cautious comments fueled speculations over a possible pause to the Fed's policy tightening in 2019.

Growing market consensus, that the Fed will do nothing in the first half, provided an additional boost, though improving risk appetite now seemed to keep a lid on any strong follow-through for the safe-haven commodity.

Moving ahead, Wednesday’s release of the minutes of the FOMC December meeting, followed by Powell's scheduled speech a day later might now help determine the non-yielding yellow metal's near-term trajectory.

In the meantime, the broader market risk sentiment and the USD price dynamics might continue to act as key determinants of the commodity's trading action ahead of today's release of the US ISM non-manufacturing PMI.

Technical levels to watch