* Gold pares loss as Europe, U.S. woes boost safe havens
* Rebound limited by investor caution after wild week
* Coming up: G7 finance ministers' meeting in France (Updates prices)
By Barani Krishnan and Jan Harvey
NEW YORK/LONDON, Sept 9 (Reuters) - Gold slid on Friday, closing its worst week since June, as profit-taking by investors and a spike in the U.S. dollar outweighed the desire for a safer haven.
Gold tumbled in early U.S. hours on apparent investor liquidation, but clawed back much of its loss by mid-afternoon as the resignation of European Central Bank policymaker Juergen Stark reignited aversion to riskier assets. [ID:nL5E7K91CF]
But even as U.S. stocks fell nearly 3 percent and other commodities tumbled, gold came under renewed pressure as two weeks of extreme volatility for bullion rattled some confidence in its bull run -- despite the prospect of a second recession.
"The weakness in stocks and the drop in bond yields to new lows have helped gold come back today, but I doubt people are building new long positions ahead of the weekend," said James Steel, metals analyst at HSBC in New York.
"Everyone's cautious after this wild week."
By 4:30 p.m. EDT (2030 GMT), spot gold
U.S. gold futures for December delivery
The spot and futures prices hit record highs above $1,920 an ounce on Tuesday, before logging daily swings of up to $87.
Wall Street stocks <.SPX>, oil
Worries that the U.S. Congress was unlikely to approve much of President Barack Obama's $447 billion plan to get jobless Americans working again added to investor angst. [ID:nN1E7880DX]
"Gold's working into a quiet Friday close after being pushed around again from lows to highs," said George Nickas, a futures broker at FC Stone in New York.
The strong dollar was suspected to be another factor
restraining gold from breaking out into a new rally. The U.S.
currency <.DXY> was up 1.2 percent against a basket of
currencies after the euro
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Asset returns in 2011: http://r.reuters.com/suz52s
Gold correlation with dollar: http://r.reuters.com/ryx52s
Inflation-adjusted gold price: http://r.reuters.com/pun62s
Gold in different currencies: http://r.reuters.com/wun62s
Gold/silver ratio: http://r.reuters.com/xyx52s
Gold/platinum ratio: http://link.reuters.com/xez92s
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Some expect gold prices to turn volatile again after a weekend meeting of Group of Seven finance ministers, at which officials of industrialized countries are expected to come under heavy pressure to revive economic growth.
France has called for a coordinated response from the G7 after anxiety over Europe's debt crisis led world stock markets to drop in recent weeks, though differences between the economic problems facing the United States, Britain and euro zone states are complicating the task. [ID:nN1E78728T]
Some traders said gold also came under pressure from platinum, which looked increasingly attractive to some investors after the white metal's prices fell below gold's this week.
"Historically gold is about half the price of platinum," said Lars Steffenson, managing director at Ebullio Capital Management. "In the last two, three weeks you've actually seen gold spike to levels where it shouldn't be.
"That obviously has to do with the sheer volume coming into gold, but a lot of the (funds) are looking long-term and saying this doesn't make sense. There is an awful lot of gold and platinum is quite tight."
Spot platinum
Prices at 2:19 p.m. EDT (1819 GMT)
LAST NET PCT YTD
CHG CHG CHG
US gold