Topic: Gold

Gold prices rose back above $1,560 an ounce in Europe on Friday, snapping four sessions of losses, as the euro recovered from two-year lows against the dollar, though worries over the outlook for the euro zone kept investors on edge.

Investors looking for bargains bought stocks, oil and gold after they were battered by worries about Europe's debt crisis.

Rio Tinto, the world's No.2 producer of iron ore, sees no signs of a slowdown in demand from top consumer China and still plans to almost double its output of the steel-making ingredient by 2016.

Gold rose on Thursday, snapping three days of losses to climb towards $1,578 an ounce, as the dollar swung back into negative territory versus the euro after a softer-than-expected U.S. manufacturing report.

When Lehman Brothers declared bankruptcy in September 2008, investors rushed to buy gold. When the eurozone crisis erupted in 2010, they bought more.' But this year the buying has fizzled out, reports the Financial Times.

Gold managed to recover most of the ground it lost in a brutal sell-off earlier on Wednesday even as sentiment and the euro remained fragile as European leaders met to discuss the deepening euro-zone debt crisis.

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Gold fell on Tuesday under the weight of a weaker euro, as investors bet against a meeting of European leaders this week doing much to tackle the region's debt crisis.

Gold prices slipped on Monday after early buying failed to lift prices past $1,600 an ounce, with investors still cautious about the precious metal as they awaited clearer signals on the euro-zone debt crisis.

With gold prices surging in recent years, the semiconductor industry has been increasingly replacing the precious metal with the more affordable copper in the wire bonding process, leading to huge savings in the cost of manufacturing a chip.

Gold prices climbed on Friday, building on the previous session's hefty gains, as a recovery in the euro prompted fresh buying of the precious metal.

Gold rose more than 1 percent on Thursday, bouncing off a 4-1/2 month low, as weaker prices attracted new physical buyers, but gains were likely to be limited as the euro was undermined by fears of a deepening debt crisis in Greece.

Global demand for gold fell five percent in the first quarter to 1,097.6 tones, according to the World Gold Council (WGC), driven by a decline in jewelry and central bank buying.

Okayama Metal & Machinery has become the first Japanese pension fund to make public purchases of gold, in a sign of dwindling faith in paper currencies. The Financial Times reports.

Gold recovered from a 2012 low, but still ended down on Wednesday, as U.S. stocks inched higher after speculation that Germany and France will act to keep Greece in the euro zone lifted the euro into the black.