Open interest in gold futures markets rose for the third session in a row on Thursday, this time by around 9.5K contracts according to preliminary readings from CME Group. Volume, instead, resumed the downtrend and shrank by around 2.7K contracts following the previous daily build.

Gold: The hunt for $2000

Gold prices rose further on Thursday and closed above the $1970 hurdle for the first time since late July. The uptick was on the back of rising open interest and leaves the door open to further upside in the very near term. Against that, the next target of note for the precious metal emerges at the key $2000 per troy ounce.