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Gold seesawed within a narrow range on Tuesday on the back of a steady dollar, as investors waited for cues on the timing of U.S. interest rate hike from nonfarm payroll data, due later this week.

Central banks -- holders of about 32,900 metric tons of bullion -- cut their purchases by 40 percent during the three months through June, compared with the same period a year earlier, to the lowest since 2011, World Gold Council figures compiled by Bloomberg show. It was the third-straight quarterly drop, the longest such streak in at least five years.

Buying declined in 2016 as prices were rallying for their biggest first-half gain in 40 years. Central banks in emerging-market nations have been adding less gold as the amount of cash they get from exports declined, said John Nugee, a manager of Bank of England reserves in the 1990s.

"Gold may be especially sensitive to that (jobs data) .release should the data be seen as likely to influence the timing of a future interest rate hike," HSBC analyst James Steel said in a note.

"While we have seen some outflows from exchange-traded funds, investors are relatively happy to hold gold, considering the environment of low-interest rates and negative yield," said ANZ analyst Daniel Hynes.

“Even though it’s falling because of what happened during Yellen’s speech just last week, as well as the increased probability for the rate hike, all in all, safe-haven demand for gold should persist,” Barnabas Gan, an economist at Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp., said in a Bloomberg TV interview.

Reference: Reuters, Bloomberg