Gold maintains mildly positive bias ahead of US data and Trump

Gold continues to find some buying interest around $1250 level and is holding with marginal gains, closer to session peak during early NA session.

Currently trading around $1254 region, a modest greenback retracement, with the key US Dollar Index flirting with the 101.00 handle, has been a key factor supporting demand for dollar-denominated commodities - like gold. Moreover, the prevalent cautious market sentiment, ahead of the big event risk - the US President Donald Trump's first address to a joint session of Congress, is further supporting the precious metal's safe-haven appeal.

However, rising odds of a rate increase at the Federal Reserve's March meeting, with the CME group's FedWatch Tool pricing-in 31% probability of such an action, seems to be weighing and collaborating towards restricting further upside for the non-yielding yellow metal. 

Next in focus would be the US economic docket, featuring the release of prelim (second estimate) Q4 US GDP growth numbers, Chicago PMI and CB's Consumer Confidence Index, which might provide some short-term trading impetus during NA trading session ahead of Trump's speech.

Technical levels to watch

Immediate resistance is pegged near $1257 level, above which the commodity seems to make a fresh attempt towards conquering the very important 200-day SMA hurdle near $1261-62 region. A follow through buying interest should now pave way for continuation of the near-term appreciating move towards its next major resistance near $1275-77 region.

On the downside, $1250 level remains immediate support to defend, which if broken has the potential to weaken the commodity back towards $1240 horizontal support before eventually dragging it further towards $1225 important horizontal support.