Gold gains

Bengaluru : Gold prices rose on Wednesday along with equities as the U.S. dollar softened, with markets showing little worry over the latest escalation in the U.S.-China trade war.

Spot gold climbed 0.4 percent to $1,202.32 an ounce by 0656 GMT. U.S. gold futures were up 0.3 percent at $1,207 an ounce. China and the United States plunged deeper into their trade feud on Tuesday after Beijing added $60 billion in U.S. products to its import tariff list in retaliation for President Donald Trump´s planned levies on $200 billion in Chinese goods. "The U.S. decision to impose a 10 percent tariff as opposed to a 25 percent one (expected) as encouraged investors in the sense there could be hope for a future compromise on trade," said John Sharma, an economist at National Australia Bank. Gold prices have declined about 12 percent since April, hurt by the intensifying U.S.-China trade dispute and on rising U.S. interest rates.