By Gina Lee

Investing.com – Gold was down on Monday morning in Asia, as the U.S. Federal Reserve’s hawkish stance on monetary policy capped gains. But, the safe-haven market support is not showing any signs of easing.

By 12:56PM ET (4:56AM GMT), they were up 0.6% to $1.671.75

Matt Simpson, senior market analyst for City Index, stated that “a bit of safe haven flows (are going) into gold today since Ukraine officially rejected Russia’s deadline,” Reuters.

Ukraine on Monday rejected Russian calls to surrender the city of Mariupol, and there seems to be no end in sight to a conflict that began with Russia’s invasion on Feb. 24.

Fed policymakers stated Friday that they need to be more aggressive in combating inflation. The move prevented additional gains for yellow metal. Neel Kashkari, Minneapolis Fed President, stated that he would like to increase rates from 1.75% to 2.2% by 2022.

Jerome Powell (Fed Chairman) and Raphael Bostic (Atlanta Fed President) will each speak in the latter part of the day. The BIS Innovation Summit 2022 will feature Christine Lagarde, President of the European Central Bank. Powell and Andrew Bailey from Bank of England will follow one day later.

SPDR Gold Trust (P) holdings rose 0.8% Friday to 1,082.44 tonnes, their highest level since March 2021.

Other precious metals saw palladium rise 2.8% to $2561.25 an ounce. The record-breaking $3,440.76 mark was reached in March. 7 due to fears about supply disruptions from Russia, which is a major producer.

Simpson stated that the auto-catalyst is reacting better to conflict in Ukraine. “Because Ukraine has officially said no to Russia it places peace talks at risk and raises concerns about supplying constraints going forward.”

Silver rose 0.4%, while platinum rose 0.8%