The value of gold in the environment is growing against the backdrop of a weak U.S. housing statistics.

Earlier, gold became cheaper in the background of statements of representatives of the U.S. Federal Reserve to restore the national economy, which slowed investors' confidence that the regulator will resort to the third round of quantitative easing policy.Thus, reduced inflation expectations, which lowered the demand for gold, which is traditionally used as a protection against inflation.

However, published on the eve of a weaker-than-expected statistics on real estate in the United States has reduced the U.S. currency. So, before it became known that the number of new homes in the U.S. in February 2012 was 698,000, which is 1.1% below the revised index for January (706,000) and 34.7% higher than in February last year (518,000) . Thus, the data were slightly worse than analysts' forecasts, the expected value of the indicator 700 000. At the same time, today's report showed that February home sales in the secondary market fell stronger than expectations of 0.9% to 4.59 million in January from a revised level of 4.63 million.

This fact has increased investor interest in gold, which led to higher prices for precious metals.

April futures price of gold on COMEX today rose to $ 1661.9 an ounce.