Gold prices edged higher Friday after Eurozone leaders, in their eighth sovereign debt crisis summit this year, agreed to craft a treaty limiting the ability of members to run-up unsustainable government debts. Leaders from 17 of the EU's 27 members, plus those from six nations aiming to join, agreed on a more fiscally integrated union. Britain flatly refused, while Sweden, the Czech Republic and Hungary planned to consult their parliaments. Participants in the all-night Brussels meeting also agreed to spend more to rescue tottering nations like Italy and Spain. The European Central Bank head promptly hailed plans for a new EU treaty that will force members to submit yearly budgets to the European Commission for approval. The praise signaled that the ECB's previously tentative approach to buying bonds from struggling Eurozone nations, whose soaring debts have made borrowing costs unmanageable, was being replaced by a more accommodative posture.

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