The gold market is seeing some selling pressureFriday after the U.S. labor market showed strong growth in January, accordingto the latest government employment data.

Friday, the U.S. Labor Department said 304,000 jobswere created in January, missing expectations; according to consensus forecastseconomists were expecting to see job gains of around 165,000. However, some ofsome of the enthusiasm in the labour market has been tempered after significantrevision to December’s employment numbers. December’s data was revised down to222,000 jobs. According to reports this is the biggest revision to theemployment numbers since 2014. “After revisions, job gains have averaged 241,000per month over the last 3 months,” the report said. At the same time theunemployment rate came in at 4.0%, a tick up from December's reading of 3.9%.

One primary reason for gold’s resilience in light of the strongjobs report is that market sentiment continues to be extremely bullish givenstatements released this week immediately following the FOMC meeting byChairman Powell. The much more dovish tone by the Federal Reserve continues tobe highly supportive of gold pricing. Also, there are geopolitical hotspotssuch as Venezuela that remain unresolved. Most importantly the current tradewar-dispute between the United States and China contains more uncertainty thanresolution, and as such remains a strong wildcard that could flare up at anymoment.

The data over the last four months strongly suggests that bullishsentiment for gold has been growing and continues to gain momentum to this day.Gold prices gained roughly 3% last month and represents the fourth consecutivemonthly gain. As long as the Federal Reserve maintains its new dovish demeanour,we can look for the precious metal to continue to have strong support and gainor at least hold pricing at current levels.