London: Gold rose on Friday on the back of a softer dollar after a report about a US probe requesting more documents linked to possible Russian interference in the 2016 election.

“The plot seems to thicken day by day and what that does is make less likely political compromise over tax cuts and fiscal stimulus,” said Jonathan Butler, commodities analyst at Mitsubishi in London.

Investigators issued a subpoena last month for documents containing specified Russian keywords from more than a dozen officials, the Wall Street Journal reported.

That helped push the dollar index against a basket of six major currencies down 0.2 per cent.

“There’s also a lot of concern that the equity market rally is possibly becoming a little exhausted for now, and that should be supportive of gold in the short term,” Butler added.

Spot gold was up 0.4 per cent at $1,283.36 (Dh4,709.93) per ounce at 1115 GMT. It is up about 0.5 per cent for the week, poised to post a second straight weekly gain.

US gold futures for December delivery rose 0.4 per cent to $1,283.30.

“Gold prices will continue a sideways drift in the coming months as rising nominal interest rates in the US keep a lid on investment demand,” BMI Research said in a note.

“Prices will grind moderately higher in the longer term as developed market inflation rebounds.”

Spot gold is biased to rise above a range of $1,270-$1,286 per ounce, and gain further towards $1,298, according to Reuters technicals analyst Wang Tao.

Silver

In other precious metals, silver added 0.1 per cent to $17.09 an ounce, lagging gold this year with gains of 7 per cent versus gold’s 10 per cent.

“There hasn’t been an intrinsic silver fundamental story for some time that market participants can trade on the back of,” UBS precious metals strategist Joni Teves said in a note.

“This has meant that interest in silver has eased in recent years and that lingering participation tends to be very much driven by short-term speculative trading interest.”

Platinum rose 0.6 per cent to $936.60 and palladium

gained 0.8 per cent to $995.

For the week, silver has risen 1.1 per cent, in what could be its best week in five. Platinum is up 0.9 per cent, heading for a third straight weekly rise, while palladium is almost unchanged.