The dollar got off on the front foot on Wednesday following two days of gains as traders awaited the Federal Reserve's Jackson Hole annual symposium later this week for clues on the path for monetary policy.

Gold futures fell modestly, as investors mostly held their fire ahead of the Federal Reserve's annual symposium this week in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

Stocks start the week just shy of record highs, underpinned by a well-received corporate earnings season and hopes the Federal Reserve will soon start reducing official borrowing costs again. Investors are therefore keen that Friday’s keynote address by Fed Chair Jerome Powell at the Jackson Hole symposium will be suitably dovish.

U.S. stocks dipped on Tuesday as investors gear up for what Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell will say about the path of interest rates at a key conference later in the week. The Nasdaq slid more than 1% to its lowest in over two weeks as megacaps Nvidia and Microsoft lost 3.

Jerome Powell has the ideal platform Friday to deliver a clear signal the Federal Reserve is about to resume cutting interest rates. But the economy isn’t giving him an equally clear signal that now is the time.

The dollar was mixed on Tuesday as traders awaited the Federal Reserve's Jackson Hole Economic Policy Symposium later this week for further clues on U.S. interest rate policy. A speech on Friday by Fed Chair Jerome Powell is this week's main focus,