Shares of Gold-Mining Companies Rise in Premarket Trading

Shares of gold-mining companies rose Tuesday in premarket trading as the price of the yellow metal increased and stock market futures indicated a lower open.

Barrick Gold Corp. rose 1.7 percent, AngloGold Ashanti Ltd. added 2.8 percent, Newmont Mining Corp. increased 1.4 percent, Gold Fields Ltd. jumped 2.2 percent and Yamana Gold Inc. was up 1.4 percent.

Stock market futures, meanwhile, pointed down: the S&P 500 futures fell 6.8 points and were below fair value and Nasdaq 100 futures dropped 5.5 points.

Spot gold was selling for $1,830.56, a gain of $35.50, and gold for December delivery, the most actively traded contract on the CME Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange, popped $31.40 to $1,823 per ounce.

Traders attributed the increase to strong physical demand and uncertainty over what the release of minutes from the August meeting of the U.S. central bank's policy meeting will show.

The Federal Reserve is divided over whether to print more money to stimulate the nation's lackluster economic growth.

For now, the Fed has managed to buy itself some time to gather more data and mull over what to do next. This is positive for gold, in our view, wrote UBS strategist Edel Tully in a note.

The market is likely to be volatile over the next few weeks, until there is clearer guidance from the Fed, which will likely come after the 2-day FOMC meeting in September. That the scheduled meeting has been extended for an extra day suggests that deliberations on potential policy actions will be comprehensive.