Gold consolidates in a range below $1500 mark

Gold extended its sideways consolidative price action on Tuesday and remained confined in a narrow trading band, below the key $1500 psychological mark.
 
A combination of diverging forces failed to provide any meaningful impetus, or assist the precious metal to build on the previous session's modest uptick, rather led to a subdued/range-bound movement through the early European session on Tuesday.

Traders remain on the sidelines

Against the backdrop of a partial trade deal between the US and China, the prevalent risk-on mood was seen as one of the key factors exerting some pressure on traditional safe-haven assets and kept a lid on any attempted move up by the commodity.
 
The downside, however, remained cushioned, at least for the time being, amid a sharp fall in the US Treasury bond yields, which eventually undermined the US Dollar demand and extended some support to the dollar-denominated commodity – Gold.
 
This coupled with firming market expectations that the Fed will cut interest rates again at its upcoming monetary policy meeting on October 29-30 might further collaborate towards limiting any deeper losses for the non-yielding yellow metal.
 
Hence, it will be prudent to wait for a sustained move in either direction before traders start positioning for any meaningful intraday move amid relatively thin US economic docket, featuring the only release of Empire State Manufacturing Index.

Technical levels to watch