Gold prices eased slightly on Wednesday as markets are expecting positive outcome for Thursday's euro zone summit as well as US debt ceiling issue.

Spot gold thus declined by 0.1% to $1,586.56 an ounce at 0913 GMT. U.S. gold futures GCv1 for August delivery were down $13.90 an ounce at $1,587.20.

On concerns over euro zone debt and debt crisis in the US gold experienced 11-session rally, longest in 40 years, moving up to $1,609.51 an ounce.

The metal fell nearly 1 percent in half an hour late on Tuesday after President Barack Obama threw his support behind efforts by a bipartisan group of senators to negotiate a new deficit-reduction plan aimed at averting a U.S. debt default.

"The preliminary (talks) on the U.S. debt ceiling looks promising and clearly that has taken some risk off the table in terms of appetite for gold," said Robin Bhar, an analyst at Credit Agricole.

"Tomorrow is the big day, with hopefully some resolution from the three or four options that have been tabled, so maybe there will be some better news out of the euro zone," he added.

"But we are certainly not out of the woods yet. There could be some hiccups along the way. Gold will get support. This is a healthy correction within the overall uptrend."

Interest in precious metals backed exchange-traded funds abated slightly after last week's revival. Holdings in the SPDR Gold Trust , the world's largest gold ETF, eased by 3.332 tonnes to 1,246.011 tonnes on July 19, after rising for two days with a total inflow of 23.933 tonnes.