Gold exchange traded funds opened lower Tuesday with the precious metal dropping below $1,700 an ounce on a strengthening dollar and jitters over the Greek debt swap this week.
Gold ETFs such as SPDR Gold Shares (NYSEArca: GLD), iShares Gold Trust (NYSEArca: IAU) and ETFS Physical Swiss Gold Shares (NYSEArca: SGOL) were down more than 2% in the early going. [ETF Chart of the Day: Gold]
The funds were also testing their 200-day simple moving average, a key technical indicator.
“Gold this year has been driven by exchange-rate mechanisms. Any dollar strength has not been positive for gold,” said Citigroup analyst David Wilson in a Reuters report.
“At some point, if confidence over Europe evaporates, you would think that should be positive for gold, but you still have to keep an eye on the dollar-gold trade-off,” he added.