Dollar down before central banks meet

Japan's market was shut because of a public holiday.

Gold rose half a percent in the spot market to $1,064.55 an ounce. The record intraday high was $1,070.40 hit on October 14. Gold is up 21 percent this year, and will likely keep its record of not having a down year since 2000.

The International Monetary Fund said on Monday it sold 200 tonnes of gold to the Reserve Bank of India for $6.8 billion (4.1 billion pounds), quietly executing half of a long-planned bullion sale that had threatened to slow gold's rally.

While the IMF's plan to sell some of its gold holdings had been flagged for a year before it was formally approved in September, the speed of the deal and the buyer were a surprise for traders, who had expected China -- not India -- to be the leading contender as Beijing diversifies its vast reserves.

"The fact that they've sold the gold to India would suggest there's going to be fewer official sales by the IMF on the market. So that might be a positive theme for the gold price," said David Moore, commodities strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia.

This was the first time since 2000 that the IMF sold gold to a central bank.

U.S. oil futures were essentially unchanged and remained above $78 a barrel. Crude's break of $80 ran out of steam in November, though near-term direction is largely pinned on the U.S. dollar.

(Additional reporting by Anirban Nag in SYDNEY; Editing by Jan Dahinten)