Gold prices pared gains Friday, after an on-target U.S. jobs report bolstered the case for the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates at a faster clip next year, Dow Jones says.

Gold for February delivery was recently unchanged at $1,169.30 a troy ounce on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange. Prices stood at around $1,173 a troy ounce before the report was released at 8:30 a.m. ET.

Nonfarm payrolls rose by a seasonally adjusted 178,000 in November from the prior month, the Labor Department said Friday. The unemployment rate dropped to 4.6% last month from 4.9% in October as some people found jobs while others dropped out of the workforce. At 4.6%, the headline figure is the lowest since August 2007.

Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal had expected 180,000 new jobs and a jobless rate of 4.9% in November.