from Reuters:

Gold rose to a six-month high on Friday as investors turned to bullion as a safe-haven from East-West tensions before a vote planned for Sunday on whether Ukraine’s Crimea region should join Russia.

Moscow shipped more troops and armor 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 a Cold War-style confrontation.

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 referendum on joining Russia, a move all but certain to lead to U.S. and European Union sanctions on Monday.

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