Gold holds weaker below $1300 mark, US retail sales data eyed for fresh impetus

   •  Surging US bond yields/positive USD exerts some downward pressure on Monday.
   •  Improving risk sentiment further dent safe-haven demand and adds to the selling bias.
   •  Today’s release of US monthly retail sales eyed some short-term trading opportunities.

Gold failed to capitalize on the previous session's post-NFP goodish up-move to one-week tops and traded with a mild negative bias through the early European session on Monday.

With investors looking past the latest disappointment from the headline NFP, a goodish pickup in the US Treasury bond yields turned out to be one of the key factors exerting some fresh downward pressure on the non-yielding yellow metal at the start of a new trading week. 

Meanwhile, positive US bond yields also extended some support to the US Dollar, which coupled with improving risk sentiment, as depicted by a positive trading sentiment around equity markets dampened the precious metal's perceived safe-haven demand and added to a mildly weaker tone.

The downside, however, remained limited, at least for the time being, amid prolonged uncertainty over Britain's exit from the European Union ahead of Tuesday's meaningful parliament vote and the fast-approaching deadline on March 29.

Moving ahead, today's US economic docket, highlighting the release of monthly retail sales data, might influence the USD price dynamics and eventually produce some meaningful trading opportunities around the dollar-denominated commodity later during the early North-American session.

Technical levels to watch

Immediate support is pegged near the $1294-93 region, below which the commodity is likely to accelerate the slide towards the $1286 intermediate support en-route last week's swing lows, around the $1281-80 area. On the flip side, sustained move beyond the key $1300 psychological mark could get extended towards the $1304-05 horizontal hurdle, which if cleared might lift the metal further towards testing the $1314-15 supply zone.