The XAU/USD pair (Gold vs. the American dollar) settled lower yesterday, pulling back after sizable gains in Friday's sessions, as that investors took some of profit off the table. Last week the bulls had taken advantage of weakness in stock markets and pushed gold prices above the 1300 level. During today's session Asian shares are in the negative territory as investors await the conclusion of a Bank of Japan policy meeting.
While equity markets are suffering and the currency market maintains negative view for the American dollar, demand for safe-haven gold could increase in the short-term and prompt funds to get back into the market. Technically speaking, the daily chart indicates that there is an intense battle going on between the bears and the bulls. Basically, the overall trend is up when prices are above the cloud, down when prices are below the cloud and flat when they are in the cloud itself.
As you can see on both the daily and 4-hour charts, the XAU/USD pair is imprisoned in the clouds. However, we have a bullish Tenkan-Sen (nine-period moving average, red line) - Kijun-Sen (twenty six-day moving average, green line) cross on the 4-hour chart and that might help the bulls build some steam and retest the 1307 level.
Beyond that level, I expect to see more resistance around the 1314 level which happens to be the top of the Ichimoku cloud on the daily time frame so breaking through this barrier is essential for a bullish continuation towards 1320. If sellers step up pressure and prices reverse, I think the first support to pay attention will be at 1293. Breaking below this support could take us back to the 1289/6 area which the bears have to capture in order to start a journey to 1277.
