Supported by increasing safe-haven demand, prices of precious metals futures on the COMEX Division of the New York Mercantile Exchange rose sharply on Friday. Gold price for February delivery gained 37 U.S. dollars, or 4.3 percent, to 895.80 dollars an ounce. The precious metal hit as high as 903.80 dollars in the session, the first time above 900 dollars since last October. For the week, gold gained 55.90 dollars, or 7%, from last Friday's closing level of 839.90 dollars an ounce. It seems the world's economy is getting worse before it gets better. The Dow Jones Index lost more than 200 points in Friday's early session due to several big companies' poor earnings. Britain's economy contracted at its fastest quarterly pace in nearly 29 years during the final three months of 2008, with GDP shrinking by 1.5% in the fourth quarter. In the era of economic turmoil, gold is definitely considered as a good choice of hedge for recession, which incents investors' safe-haven buying, analysts indicated. Safe-haven is the main factor which pushed gold's price to climb continuously in recent trading days. Other precious metals did a good job, too. March silver climbed57.5 cents to 11.94 dollars per ounce. April platinum ended at 958dollars per ounce, up 23.10 dollars.

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