"Talks with China are going very well!" US president Donald Trump tweeted earlier.
Commodities were mixed, with copper closing lower on the London Metal Exchange and palladium hitting a fresh high.
It was worth US$1,321 an ounce on the spot market earlier - above gold's value of $1,281.50/oz.
Among the majors, Freeport-McMoRan closed up 1.8% in New York and Rio Tinto (LSE: RIO) gained 0.8% in London yesterday.
However BHP (ASX: BHP) was off 0.2% in Australian trade at the time of writing.
Toronto's metals and mining stocks closed higher yesterday, up 1.28%.
New Gold (TSX: NGD) rose almost 12% as it reported a strong fourth quarter, saying the best-ever quarterly production from its Rainy River mine in Ontario marked "a pivotal turning point".
Finally among the juniors, Origin Gold (TSXV: OIC) rose C2c or 20% yesterday on preliminary results from trenching at its La Pantera property in Colombia, reporting a quartz vein system returned values of up to 3.9g/t gold.
