Gold has 'growing potential' to break $1,800 an ounce

NEWS SUMMARY: Precious metal prices steadied Monday on safe-haven demand despite a firmer dollar. U.S. stocks traded mostly lower as traders weighed the reopening of the economy along with brewing tensions between China and the U.S.

UBS/CNBC "Gold prices could 'break the highs' seen earlier this year...according to UBS Investment Bank's Joni Teves. 'There is growing potential (for gold) to break $1,800 (per ounce) in my view,' Joni Teves, precious metal strategist at UBS Investment Bank, told CNBC's 'Squawk Box Asia' on Monday. In the near term, the firm has a target price for gold at $1,790 per ounce. That comes as 'investor interest continues to grow in this environment of uncertainty and negative real rates,' Teves said....Last week, the World Gold Council released its first-quarter 2020 demand trends report for the precious metal, where it highlighted that the global coronavirus outbreak was 'the single biggest factor influencing gold demand.' 'As the scale of the pandemic - and its potential economic impact - started to emerge, investors sought safe-haven assets,' the report said. 'Gold ETFs saw the highest quarterly inflows for four years amid global uncertainty and financial market volatility.' For her part, UBS' Teves said the move in gold had been drive by a 'pickup in investor interest, particularly from institutional investors.' 'Gold is becoming attractive in this environment where uncertainty is very high, growth is expected to weaken, and at the same time you have negative real rates which make gold attractive to hold as a diversifier in investor portfolios,' Teves said."