Trading of domestic gold market cool

The trading of the domestic gold market has been cool, said chairperson U Myo Myint of Yangon Region Gold Entrepreneurs Association (YGEA).
He also explained that the gold trading market is cool because it is difficult to withdraw money because of the banks’ closure, transmit the funds from one bank to another, and go from one place to another because of the barricades laid on the roads. On top of all, there lacks the safety of the gold shops.
Consequently, the daily business of 50 visses (a viss equals 1.6kg) of gold was earlier done in the market. Now, about five or ten visses are only being traded daily.
“The gold market is being excellent with some buying a piece of gold instead of depositing the cash in the bank. The market also could not sell many gold visses when many people could not buy even a tiny piece of gold.
A portion of gold means ten ticals or 20 ticals (0.578 ounces, or 0.016 kilogrammes). Now, about five or ten viss are only being traded daily, he clarified.
Besides the transportation problems, the raw materials have become scarce because of fewer supplies from gold mining and the old gold scraps are refined into pure gold bars, according to YRGEA.
“The raw materials do not enter from outside. The old gold scraps sold to the gold shops are refined into pure gold bars. There is no outside raw material. There are many checkpoints on the road, and the traders dare not come. The cash is not easy to transfer from the bank recently,” said U Myo Myint.
At present, the pure gold price is about K 1,442,500 per tical (0.578 ounces, or 0.016 kilograms) on 17 April in the domestic market, while global gold price touches a high of above US$ 1,780 per ounce.
Further, the dollar to kyat exchange rate was at K 1,570 per dollar on 27 April.
Therefore, the global gold versus dollar exchange rate remains skyrocketing. The domestic gold price will be still as high as the worldwide gold price and dollar exchange rate, according to the YGEA. — NN/GNLM