On Windows normally you don't have a HOME environment variable, but you
have USERPROFILE, available in all versions of windows.
The following patch take this into account:

--------------------
--- ./lib/netrc.c.org 2012-04-03 19:14:56 -0500
+++ ./lib/netrc.c 2012-04-03 19:15:50 -0500
@@ -81,6 +81,8 @@

    if(!netrcfile) {
      home = curl_getenv("HOME"); /* portable environment reader */
+ if(!home)
+ home = curl_getenv("USERPROFILE");
      if(home) {
        home_alloc = TRUE;
  #if defined(HAVE_GETPWUID) && defined(HAVE_GETEUID)
--------------------

Regards,

-- 
Cesar
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