From Chris Mullen at GoldSeek.com...

Gold Prices rose as high as $808.00 in Asia on Thursday before dropping as low as $794.45 by midmorning in New York.

The Gold Market then rallied back higher to $802.27 ahead of another drop into the US close that left it near its earlier low with a loss of 0.62% for the day.

Silver climbed to $14.51 and fell to $14.14 before it rallied back higher to $14.343, but it also fell back off into the close and ended with a loss of 0.70%.

Gold Priced in Euros fell to about €539, platinum gained $7 to $1443, palladium gained $1 to $345, and copper gained nearly 6 cents to about $3.09.

Gold and silver mining equities fell about 2% at the open before they rallied back near unchanged by late morning, but they then fell back off into the close and ended with about 1% losses.

New Home Sales were up 1.7% in October according to new data Thursday, but that was only because Sept.'s sales were revised down from 770,000 to 716,000.  Compared to a year ago, sales were down 23.5% while inventories fell to an 8.5 month supply.

Also on the housing front cam a report showing that foreclose filings were up an astounding 94% from a year ago.

The US Dollar index ignored these poor economic data and rose in technical trade as it furthered its bounce from an oversold position on poor economic indications from the United Kingdom and Germany that weakened the Pound and Euro.

Ben Bernanke of the Federal Reserve spoke after the close in a much-anticipated speech. Friday at 08:30 EST brings Personal Income and Spending for October, expected to show 0.4% and 0.3% growth respectively, plus Core PCE Inflation expected at 0.2%.

In the broader markets, crude oil topped $95 overnight on news of an explosion and an ensuing fire on an Enbridge pipeline in Minnesota that killed two workers and halted the flow of oil from Canada to the US on as many as four pipelines initially. But light sweet crude ended well off its highs with a relatively small gain near $91 as Enbridge assured the market that supply would not be impacted and all operations would be back to normal in just 2 or 3 days.

Treasuries rose on fresh credit worries and the slowing housing market. The Dow, Nasdaq, and S&P waffled near unchanged throughout the day and ended slightly higher as traders waited for Bernanke’s comments.

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