(Reuters) - Gold on Friday hovered near one-month highs touched the session before, with traders waiting for U.S. jobs data later in the day for clues on the pace of possible U.S. interest rate hikes in 2017.
FUNDAMENTALS
* Spot gold > had eased 0.2 percent to $1,178.53 an ounce by 0056 GMT. The metal on Thursday hit its highest since Dec. 5 at $1,184.90.
* U.S. gold futures
* Investors are focussed on Friday's U.S. non-farm payrolls report, with economists expecting job gains of 178,000 in December.
* U.S. services sector activity held at a one-year high in December as new orders surged, while the number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits fell near a 43-year-low last week, suggesting the economy ended 2016 with strong momentum.
* A raft of data from China in coming weeks is expected to show the world's second-largest economy carried solid momentum into 2017, thanks to heavy government stimulus and a construction boom that breathed new life into its ailing smokestack industries.
* Euro zone producer prices rose for the third consecutive month in November on a monthly basis, mostly driven by soaring energy prices which offset subdued prices for consumer goods, estimates released on Thursday by Eurostat showed.
* SPDR Gold Trust
MARKET NEWS
* The U.S. dollar wobbled near three-week lows and U.S. bonds were bought back on Friday as investors wound back 'Trump trade', helping to lift the world's stocks to 1-1/2 year highs. [MKTS/GLOB]
* Oil prices were little changed on Friday after gaining nearly 1 percent the day before on news that Saudi Arabia had cut production to meet OPEC's agreement to reduce output. [O/R]
(Reporting by Nallur Sethuraman in Bengaluru; Editing by Joseph Radford)
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