Gold Price Forecast: XAU/USD retreats from one-week high amid a goodish USD rebound

Gold trims a part of its intraday gains to a one-week high touched earlier this Thursday and retreats below the $1,760 area during the early North American session. The US dollar stages a goodish rebound from the weekly low and turns out to be a key factor that acts as a headwind for the dollar-denominated commodity.

Elevated US Treasury bond yields, bolstered by hawkish Fed expectations, along with mostly upbeat US macro releases, assist the USD to stall its intraday slide and attract some dip-buying at lower levels. The Preliminary US GDP report, the second reading, showed that the world's largest economy contracted by 0.6% annualized pace during the second quarter as compared to the 0.9% fall estimated previously. Adding to this, the Weekly Initial Jobless Claims unexpectedly edged lower to 243K in the week ended August 19 from the previous week's downwardly revised print of 245K.

The data reaffirms bets for a further policy tightening by the US central bank, though traders prefer to wait for a more hawkish message from Fed Chair Jerome Powell at the Jackson Hole Symposium on Friday. Even so, Fed funds futures traders are pricing in a 61% chance that the Fed will hike rates by another 75 basis points (bps) at its September meeting, and a 39% probability of a 50 basis point increase, per Reuters. Meanwhile, the early optimistic move in the equity markets, led by China's stimulus measures, runs out of steam amid worries about a deeper global economic downturn.

It is worth mentioning that China’s Cabinet, State Council, outlined a 19-point policy package while announcing economic stimulus measures worth CNY1 trillion ($146 billion) to stimulate growth affected by covid lockdowns and property market crisis, per Bloomberg. Additionally, Li Zhong, Vice Minister of the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, said on Thursday that China will focus on expanding jobs and promoting fiscal, monetary and industrial policies to support job market stabilization. Market participants, however, remain sceptical in the face of headwinds stemming from China's fresh COVID-19 lockdowns and the meltdown of the property sector.

This, in turn, tempers investors' appetite for perceived riskier assets, which is evident from an intraday pullback in the equity markets and continues to offer some support to the safe-haven gold. Nevertheless, the XAU/USD, so far, manages to hold in the positive territory for the third successive day, though the mixed fundamental backdrop warrants some caution before positioning for any further appreciating move.

Technical levels to watch