By Frank Tang and Clara Denina
NEW YORK/LONDON (Reuters) - Gold rose on Friday, reaching a six-month high as investors added bullion as an insurance before a key vote in Crimea over the weekend to decide whether the region will join Russia, which could further heighten geopolitical tensions.
Moscow shipped more troops and armour into Crimea on Friday and repeated its threat to invade other parts of Ukraine, showing no sign of heeding Western pleas to back off from the worst East-West confrontation since the Cold War.
Russia's stock markets tumbled and the cost of insuring its debt soared on the last day of trading before pro-Moscow authorities in Crimea hold a vote to join Russia, a move all but certain to lead to U.S. and European Union sanctions on Monday.
"There are people here with possible concerns that you will see a heavy price spike (in gold) if this vote does go in," said Thomas Capalbo, a precious metals trader at Newedge, a brokerage in New York. "Gold is up on situational buying."
The metal has gained almost 3 percent this week so far, in what would mark its sixth straight weekly rise, helped by China's first corporate bond default and fears of slowdown in the world's second-largest economy.
Spot gold rose as much as 1.4 percent to its highest level since September9 at $1,387.90 an ounce earlier in the session.
It later pared gains and was last trading up 0.4 percent to $1,376.10 by 12:24 p.m. EST (1623 GMT).
U.S. gold futures rose $4.30 to $1,376.70 an ounce, with trading volume set to finish above its 30-day average, preliminary Reuters data showed.
The yellow metal was also supported after data showed U.S. consumer sentiment weakened in early March as an unusually harsh winter appeared to dim views on the economy's prospects.
FED WATCH
The market was awaiting the U.S. Federal Reserve's policy meeting on March 18-19. The central bank is expected to announce another $10 billion cut to its bond-buying stimulus.
A series of U.S. economic data showing that growth has been hurt by severe cold weather has recently hit the dollar, which fell 0.3 percent against a basket of currencies after weak U.S. producer prices on Friday.
Global uncertainties sent investors looking for gold, with holdings in SPDR Gold Trust - the world's largest gold-backed exchange-traded fund - rising 2.1 tonnes to 813.30 tonnes on Thursday.
Among other precious metals, silver followed gold's moves, with a 1 percent increase to $21.34 an ounce. Platinum was down 0.1 percent at $1,469.49 an ounce, while palladium fell 0.4 percent to $770 an ounce.
(Additional reporting by A. Ananthalakshmi in Singapore; Editing by Jason Neely and Stephen Powell)
