Platinum, used mainly in jewellery and to cut toxic vehicle exhaust emissions, fixed at $410 in London versus the previous afternoon's $401. "There's a lot of platinum around, it's just in the wrong hands," one London dealer said. "The funds were good buyers of it two weeks ago, which should have provided fresh lending liquidity, but nothing's come of it," he further added. There's something going on," he added. Bullion banks take precious metals on deposit, paying interest to the owners while lending the metal for derivative products such as options and futures and using the lease rates to set price product prices. Tighter lease rates tend to drive spot prices higher.

"It's been a bit crazyon platinum this morning, there's been some borrowing coming in which has driven the lease rates higher," another dealer said. Platinum bid/offer spreads of $5 against the usual $2 showed dealers were reluctant to trade having seen prices hit 17-month highs this week as the metal tracked gold's rise. Gold continued to trade near $300 an ounce having shot higher earlier in the week. Gold had rocketed after Sunday's pledge by 15 European central banks to limit gold sales to 400 tonnes annually for the next five years, including those flagged by Britain and Switzerland. The banks also promised to limit lending and gold derivatives market activities to current levels, spooking the gold lending market and stoking the price move.