By Gina Lee

Investing.com – Gold was up on Friday morning in Asia but remained close to a two-week low hit during the previous session. A that the omicron COVID-19 variant cannot be considered “mild”, alongside stronger yields, gave the safe-haven asset a boost.

The yellow metal fell to its lowest weekly level since November 2021, with a gain of 0.06% at $1,790.25 (9:30 PM ET). Benchmark reached its highest point since March 2021.

Omicron seems to cause less severe illness than the Delta strain, but it shouldn’t be classified as mild according to Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director general.

Even the most dovish of U.S. Federal Reserve officials are on board with the central bank’s hawkish policy. Mary Daly, President of the San Francisco Fed said that trimming the Fed’s balance sheet will be possible after the Fed raises its funds rate. James Bullard, President of the St. Louis Fed, stated at an additional event that the Fed may raise its target interest rates as early as March 2022.

CME FedWatch shows that investors anticipate a higher than 70% rate increase of 25 basis points or more at March Fed’s meeting.

Investors are now awaiting the U.S. Jobs Report, which is due to be released later today. Thursday’s data showed that the number rose to 207,000 for the previous week.

In Asia Pacific, data released earlier in the day showed that Japan’s household spending contracted 1.3% and 1.2% and in November. Dec. saw a 0.5% increase in household spending year over year.

Other precious metals: Silver was flat at $22.16 per ounce. Platinum edged up 0.2%, and palladium climbed 0.1%.