Investors ploughed cash into gold and treasury bonds as the gathering turmoil on global stock markets triggered a stampede towards the last remaining safe havens.

<p><a href="http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/investing/article-2027655/Invstors-safe-haven-stampede-amid-growing-market-turmoil.html"><br /></a>The price of gold reached an all-time high of more than $1829.70, adding credibility to suggestions by some City analysts that the precious metal could hit $2000 by the end of the year. <br /><br />It also means that had Gordon Brown not sold 400 tonnes of gold for £2.3billion in 1999, Britain would be £12billion richer if it sold the same amount today. <br /><br /><br />Not so risky business: Investors ploughed cash into gold and treasury bonds as the gathering turmoil on global stock markets triggered a stampede towards the last remaining safe havens<br /><br />In an extraordinary signal of the mania for gold, President Hugo Chavez ordered the Venezuelan Central Bank to repatriate $11billion of reserves held outside the country including 99 tonnes in the vaults of the Bank of England. <br /><br />The hunt for a safe port in the economic storm boosted US Treasury bonds, seen as an island of safety despite signs the world’s largest economy is in increasingly poor health. <br /><br />Yields on ten-year US Treasury bonds fell below 2 per cent for the first time in 60 years, as investors fleeing equity markets settled for basement interest rates on loans to the US. <br /><br />The last time US government bond yields fell through the 2 per cent mark was when they hit an all-time low amid the Great Depression sparked by the Wall Street Crash of 1929. <br /><br />Yields on UK ten-year gilts hit record lows of 2.238 per cent, not far off the European benchmark safe haven of German bunds. Oil – the price of which corresponds with forecasts for global growth – inched down, with Brent crude losing more than $3 to $107.50. <br /><br />The fall hit Britain’s two oil supermajors, knocking 13p off BP’s share price to close at 400p, while Shell lost 64p to 1929.5p.<br /><br />A host of other commodities which also tend to track expectations for industrial demand slumped, hitting firms whose fortunes are tied up in the price of metals. <br /><br />Miners were some of the biggest fallers on the FTSE100, led down by Xstrata, which lost 110p to 972p. Commodities trader Glencore staggered down 39.55p to 355.45p.</p>

Investors ploughed cash into gold and treasury bonds as the gathering turmoil on global stock markets triggered a stampede towards the last remaining safe havens.

The price of gold reached an all-time high of more than $1829.70, adding credibility to suggestions by some City analysts that the precious ...

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