Gold hits six-week high as Fed indicates cautious approach to rate hikes

BENGALURU (Reuters) - Gold touched a six-week high early on Thursday as the U.S. Federal Reserve signalled it could be less aggressive in tightening monetary policy next year.

FUNDAMENTALS

* Spot gold > had risen 0.4 percent to $1,296.10 an ounce at 0054 GMT. Bullion touched a session-peak of $1,297.70, its highest since May 3.

* U.S. gold climbed 0.9 percent to $1,299.40

* The U.S. Federal Reserve kept interest rates unchanged on Wednesday and signalled it still planned to raise rates twice in 2016, though it said slower economic growth would crimp the pace of monetary policy tightening in future years.

* A small majority of Wall Street's top banks expect the Fed to raise interest rates no more than once this year, results of a Reuters poll showed Wednesday.

 

* The Bank of Japan is expected to keep monetary policy steady on Thursday even as volatile financial markets, sluggish global growth and anaemic inflation keep policymakers under pressure to do more to reflate the economy out of stagnation.

* Holdings in SPDR Gold Trust , the world's largest gold-backed exchange-traded fund, rose 0.23 percent to 900.75 tonnes on Wednesday, the highest since October 2013. [GOL/ETF]

* South Africa's Northam Platinum lost 15 million rand ($983,026) a day in revenue during a week-long work stoppage at Zondereinde mine, a company spokeswoman said on Wednesday.

* A run of strong Thai exports this year should be welcome news for the trade-dependent economy, but rather than reflecting healthy shipments of goods such as cars or textiles speculative gold sales have often had an outsized influence.

* Russia's Polymetal plans to borrow $350 million from Sberbank to finance the development of its Kazakh gold field Kyzyl, chief executive Vitaly Nesis told reporters in Astana on Wednesday.

* For the top stories on metals and other news, click [TOP/MTL] or [GOL]

MARKET REPORT

* Asian stocks edged up on Thursday after the Fed Reserve refrained from hiking interest rates, while the dollar sagged against its peers. [MKTS/GLOB][USD/]

DATA AHEAD (GMT)

0900 Euro zone inflation final May

1100 Bank of England announces interest rate decision

1230 U.S. consumer prices May

1230 U.S. weekly jobless claims

1230 U.S. Philly Fed business index Jun

1400 U.S. NAHB housing market index Jun

(Reporting by Vijaykumar Vedala in Bengaluru; Editing by Joseph Radford)