On Wednesday gold and copper prices edged higher in Asia on a gain in a services survey in China that showed a pickup in activity. Silver slightly declined.
On the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange, gold futures for June delivery rose 0.11% to $1,194.50 a troy ounce.
Silver for July delivery fell 0.10% to $16.563 a troy ounce.
Copper gained 0.13% to $2.933 a pound, after the China services data. China is the world's top importer of copper.
In China, the April HSBC services PMI climbed to 52.9. The PMI was at 52.3 in the previous month.
Overnight, the dollar weakened amid a series of soft U.S.
economic data, giving a boost to the gold futures which extended gains.
In March the U.S. trade deficit jumped to its highest level in more than six years, as a prolonged labor dispute at critical West Coast ports and the stronger dollar weighed heavily on foreign trade.
The U.S. Department of Commerce said in a report that the nation's trade deficit surged 43.1% to $51.4 billion, its highest level since Fall, 2008. The percentage increase was also the highest since December, 1996. Gold reached a session-high of 1,199 after the release.
The deficit rose $16 billion to $67.2 billion in March, up from $51.2 billion a month earlier, when adjusted for inflation. March exports climbed modestly to $187.8 billion, while imports surged by more than $17 billion to $239.2 billion for the month.
The widening of the trade deficit has led to rising concern of a contraction in the economy in the first quarter.
The U.S. Commerce Department said last week that GDP for the first quarter climbed by 0.2%, in line with paltry estimates from the Federal Reserve of Atlanta. A jump in exports indicating the stronger greenback was the heaviest drag on GDP growth, the Commerce Department said.
Following its April meeting last week, the Federal Open Market Committee repeated that it will take a data-driven approach to the timing of its first interest rate hike since the end of the Financial Crisis.
Gold, which is not attached to interest rates or dividends, struggles to compete with high yield-bearing assets in periods of rising rates.
Elsewhere, Markit's Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) fell to 57.4 in April, below a preliminary reading of 57.8 earlier in the month. In March, the PMI soared to 59.2 the highest level since August.
Meanwhile, the Institute of Supply Management reported that its non-manufacturing purchasing manager's index increased to 57.8 last month, above forecasts of 56.2 and up from 56.5 in March.
