Gold Rises to $1,000 For 1st Time on Demand for Haven From Weaker Dollar

Gold traded at $1,000 an ounce in New York and rose to a record in London on speculation credit- market turmoil will spur demand for the metal as a haven from declines in stocks and the dollar.

Silver, platinum and palladium also advanced as the dollar fell below 100 yen for the first time since 1995 and to a record low against the euro after a Carlyle Group fund moved closer to collapse. Gold climbed 19 percent this year as the dollar fell and world equity markets declined.

``The financial system's in trouble at the moment and people are going to the safety of gold,'' said Mario Innecco, a futures broker at MF Global Ltd. in London. ``You can't create gold so easily as you can create dollars or euros or pounds.''

April futures climbed $15.30, or 1.6 percent, to $995.80 an ounce on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange after trading at $1,000 for the first time.

Gold for immediate delivery rose $11.15, or 1.1 percent, to $994.08 an ounce as of 12:45 p.m. in London after earlier gaining to $997.67, exceeding the previous all-time high of $992.05 last week.

Gold is the ``anti-dollar,'' JPMorgan Cazenove Ltd. analysts including Fraser Jamieson wrote in a report this week, raising their gold price forecast to $910 an ounce this year from $720. Jamieson declined to comment when phoned in London today.

The MSCI World Index, a benchmark for stock markets in developed nations, dropped 0.7 percent today, bringing the decline this year to about 11 percent.

``We remain long of gold and short of equities,'' U.S. trader and economist Dennis Gartman wrote in his daily Gartman Letter today. A ``long'' is a bet on higher prices and ``short'' is a bet on a decline.

`So Clear'

``The trend is so clear that we are adding to our long gold/short equity trade this morning,'' Gartman wrote.

Once gold goes over $1,000, it will continue rising, said MF Global's Innecco.

``It's going to be like crude going over $100 a barrel,'' he said. Oil has climbed 10 percent since exceeding that level on Feb. 19.

Assets in the StreetTracks Gold Trust, the biggest exchange- traded fund backed by gold, were unchanged yesterday at 652.5 metric tons, compared with the record 654.9 tons on March 10.

Platinum climbed $37.25, or 1.8 percent, to $2,105.25 an ounce, rising for a fourth day. An increase in power supplies in South Africa, the world's biggest producer, will provide mines with 95 percent of their power needs while cities may now face power cuts, the government said last week.

`Dim The Lights'

``There is a tension between the private consumer and big industrial user,'' said Allan Kerr, chief executive officer of Wogen Plc, the London-based trading company of metals including platinum. ``Do they dim the lights in the restaurants so they can produce ferrochrome? That sort of tension is still there I think.''

Jubilee Platinum Plc will consider building its own power plant for its Tjate platinum project in South Africa, the London- based company said today.

Palladium gained $5.50, or 1.1 percent, to $509.50 an ounce and silver advanced 48.25 cents, or 2.4 percent, to $20.6375 an ounce. The UBS Bloomberg Constant Maturity Commodity Index of 26 raw materials is up 21 percent this year.

To graph technical gauges for gold: Moving Averages Relative Strength Index Fibonacci Back Test Technical Gauges