 "Gold up 6.7% in Jan on renewed prospect as safe asset")
Gold eased more than one per cent on Monday, extending its slide from a near two-year peak hit last week, as polls ahead of a referendum showed Britain could opt to remain in the European Union (EU).
Three opinion polls ahead of Thursday's vote showed the 'Remain' camp recovering some momentum, although the overall picture remained one of an evenly split electorate.
Easing concerns over 'Brexit' sparked a rally in Asian stocks and the sterling, and increased investor appetite for risk assets, hurting gold.
A vote by Britain to leave the 28-member EU, dubbed "Brexit", could tip Europe back into recession, putting more pressure on the global economy and thus boosting the safe haven appeal of bullion.
Spot gold dropped 1.1 per cent to $1,283.96 an ounce at 0701 GMT, after touching a low of $1,280.15 earlier in the session.
Bullion closed 1.5 per cent higher on Friday to post its biggest single day gain since June 3. The precious metal hit its highest since August 2014 in intraday trade on Thursday.
US gold slid 0.6 per cent to $1,287.30.
"We have to suspect that markets will remain quite choppy in the lead up to the British vote and in gold's case, the path of least resistance will likely be higher," INTL FCStone analyst Edward Meir said in a note.
"There could be a 'post-vote' let down on Friday and heading into the following week, especially if investors realise that a 'Leave' vote is not going to have the Armageddon-like ending many are fearing," he added.
There was, however, some optimism for bullion as holdings in SPDR Gold Trust, the world's largest gold-backed exchange-traded fund, rose 0.59 per cent to 907.88 tonnes on Friday, the highest since September 2013.
Hedge funds and money managers took their bullish stance in gold to the highest in nearly five years in the week to June 14, US government data showed on Friday.
"The best case scenario for gold in the coming few days is that it stabilises at the current level just ahead of the $1,300 resistance level. But there could be a bit of pull-back to about $1,250-$1,260," said Mark To, head of research at Hong Kong's Wing Fung Financial Group.
"By the end of June, I think $1,300-$1,400 should be relatively a reasonable price for gold," he added.
Among other precious metals, silver fell 0.7 per cent to $17.35 and platinum was down 0.1 per cent to $966.49.
Palladium, which touched its lowest since May 25 on Friday, climbed 0.8 per cent to hit $535.72.
