Gold Demand Explodes 'Round The World (ROUNDUP)

Here is a round-up of stories from the last few days showing (in contrary to a few curious news stories) demand for physical gold exploding around the world in response to unusually low prices.

• Eric Sprott: Global Gold Demand Is Overwhelming Supply -

  We see almost 60 tons a week being delivered on the Shanghai Gold Exchange. Well, you start annualizing 60 tons a week you're talking 3,000 tons a year now. We saw 94 tons of gold go into India in September. We saw the Russian Central Bank buy 37 tons of gold in September. I mean I could come up with numbers that might suggest that we've got 400 tons a week of demand. And we only got 230 tons a week of mine supply. And I've only gotten to three data points. I haven't even gone to the rest of the world.

• Who's Feeding China's Gold Hunger? -

  This year the Chinese have started to import more gold directly into the mainland, circumventing Hong Kong. Unfortunately China itself doesn't publish gold trade data -- as they prefer to keep the world uninformed about their gold hunger not to influence the price. China openly changed import policy in April (from 1:14):

• India Precious Metals Import Explodes In October -

  Despite all efforts from the Indian government to curtail India's demand for precious metals -- for example a 10 % import duty on both gold and silver, the Indian people continue to put their savings in a store of value they consider being prudent; precious metals.

• Low UAE gold prices set off buying surge -

  ... the ongoing softness in global gold prices are prompting more shoppers to snap up more of the metal in its various forms. According to estimates from the local jewellery trade, retail offtake for the full year in the UAE could be up by 15-20 per cent in volume terms (in kilograms) compared with 2013. If only the second half of the year is taken into account, which was when prices started to show real weakness, volume gains could even be in the 40 per cent range.

• `Gold Wars' - Swiss Gold Shenanigans Intensify Prior To November 30 Vote -

  The Swiss National Bank (SNB) and establishment parties went "all in" during the week and intensified their campaign. They suggested that passing the Swiss Gold Initiative would be a `fatal' for Switzerland and would be positive only for speculators.