PRECIOUS-Gold rises ahead of Euro meeting; Cyprus needs money

* Gold turns higher as equities, crude sell off
* Cyprus, Spain debt woes trigger safe-haven bids
* Physical buying from India remains weak

(Recasts, adds details, updates market activity)
By Frank Tang
NEW YORK, June 25 (Reuters) - Gold rose on Monday, breaking
ranks with the lower equities and crude oil markets, as
safe-have buying was promoted by growing uncertainty ahead of a
key European summit and signs of a worsening debt crisis in that
region.
The metal spiked higher after being range bound early on
Monday.
News of Cyprus became the fifth euro zone country needing
rescue funds hours after Spain formally requested help for its
banks, and Germany's opposition to issue euro zone bonds to
boost the single currency also increased gold's investment
appeal.
Gold's rally was particularly impressive on a day when Wall
Street dropped nearly 2 percent and crude oil prices
were down on investors' skepticism that an EU summit
this week would result in action on the bloc's crisis. A grains
rally due to dry weather in the U.S. Midwest underpinned gold
buying.
"It's obviously a flight to quality, and gold is trading
like a currency instead of a commodity. Until gold breaks out of
this trading range, I suspect volume is going to remain tepid,"
said James Dailey, portfolio manager of TEAM Financial Asset
Management.
Spot gold was up 0.8 percent at $1,583.99 an ounce by
2:31 p.m. EDT (1831 GMT).
Silver rose 2.7 percent to $27.57 an ounce on pent-up
demand after the metal has recently underperformed gold.
Some investors covered their bearish bets after gold posted
a 3.5 percent decline last week on deflation worries and a lack
of aggressive Federal Reserve stimulus.
On Friday, gold briefly crossed into negative territory for
2012 due to frustration over the Federal Reserve's decision to
lengthen its "Operation Twist" program aimed at lowering
long-term interest rates instead of a new outright bond purchase
program
U.S. gold futures for August delivery settled up
$21.50 an ounce at $1,588.40.
U.S. futures trading volume was just more than half of its
30-day average, preliminary Reuters data showed.
Turnover was light as some traders avoided adding positions
because of likely volatility from news out of the two-day
meeting of EU leaders in Brussels that begins on Thursday.
James Steel, chief commodity analyst at HSBC, said gold was
helped by safe-haven bids against the headwinds of weaker crude
and equities, which are usually negative on bullion prices.

INDIAN DEMAND WEAK
Physical buying from India, one of the world's top bullion
consumer, failed to rebound despite a recovery in the rupee from
last week's record lows versus the dollar, dealers said.
Analysts attributed the metal's recent weakness to a sharp
decline in gold import from India year-on-year because of the
high price of gold in local terms due to its weak currency.
Among other precious metals, spot platinum was up 0.5
percent at $1,434.45 an ounce, while spot palladium
inched down 0.1 percent to $603.15 an ounce.
2:31 PM EDT LAST/ NET PCT LOW HIGH CURRENT
SETTLE CHNG CHNG VOL
US Gold AUG 1588.40 21.50 1.4 1566.90 1589.00 103,804
US Silver JUL 27.52 0.859 3.2 26.565 27.590 64,679
US Plat JUL 1439.40 8.20 0.6 1428.10 1442.30 12,201
US Pall SEP 607.25 0.05 0.0 604.25 612.35 1,648

Gold 1583.99 12.55 0.8 1566.96 1587.90
Silver 27.570 0.730 2.7 26.680 27.650
Platinum 1434.45 7.00 0.5 1432.65 1441.74
Palladium 603.15 -0.85 -0.1 607.23 610.09

TOTAL MARKET VOLUME 30-D ATM VOLATILITY
CURRENT 30D AVG 250D AVG CURRENT CHG
US Gold 112,415 213,682 194,847 25.24 1.98
US Silver 107,730 53,202 52,528 34.04 0.42
US Platinum 22,115 10,089 7,987 18 0.00
US Palladium 1,703 5,553 4,593

(Additional reporting by Jan Harvey in London; Editing by Bob
Burgdorfer)