Gold Regains Ground After Slumping To Two-Week Low

(RTTNews) - Following the notable pullback seen over the past few sessions, the price of gold regained some ground during trading on Friday.

Gold for May delivery climbed $21.90 or 0.7 percent to $3,231.90 an ounce but still slumped by $51.60 or 1.6 percent for the week.

The rebound by the price of the precious metal may have reflected bargain hunting after gold hit its lowest levels in over two weeks on Thursday.

Gold futures may also have benefitted from a decrease in the value of the U.S. dollar, with the U.S. dollar index well off its lows of the day but still down by 0.3 percent.

The increase by gold came despite the release of a closely watched Labor Department report showing U.S. job growth far exceeded economist estimates in the month of April.

The Labor Department said non-farm payroll employment shot up by 177,000 jobs in April compared to expectations for an increase of about 130,000 jobs.

At the same time, the jumps in employment in February and March were downwardly revised to 102,000 jobs and 185,000 jobs, respectively, reflecting a net downward revision of 58,000 jobs.

The report also said the unemployment rate came in at 4.2 percent in April, unchanged from the previous month and in line with economist estimates.