Gold from a mine being weighed in at a refinery: a worker sets a rough bar on the scale while a second person watches, both seen from behind

The trade

Measured
in grams

How a trade runs

Gold is paid for by what it weighs and how fine it is. Everything in a trade exists to settle those two numbers in the open, where both sides can see them.

01 · Agreement

Terms
before metal

How much, how pure, where it changes hands and how it is paid: written down and agreed before anything moves.

One pair of hands passing a folder across a table to another

01 · Agreement

Terms
before metal

Both sides exchange their company papers first, so each knows who the other is.

Then the terms of the shipment are set out in writing. Nothing ships on a handshake.

The terms cover what matters once the gold is moving: the quantity, the expected fineness, where the gold changes hands, who carries and insures it, where it is tested, and how the price is set.

A first shipment is usually small. It lets both sides see the whole process work once before the quantities grow.

02 · At the source

Exported
by the book

The gold leaves its country under that country’s own rules, with its own papers. It is weighed and tested there before it moves.

A steel pan of pale crushed ore with flecks of gold

02 · At the source

Exported
by the book

Every producing country has its own way of weighing, testing, recording and releasing gold for export.

We work inside that system, with the partner the country calls for, and the paperwork travels with the metal.

In one country a public body weighs, tests and exports the gold itself. In another, licensed companies do. The names of the steps differ. The result is the same: the gold is declared, recorded and released by the country it comes from.

The weight and the test result recorded at export travel with the shipment. The refinery’s figures in Dubai are later set beside them.

03 · Dubai

Carried
under seal

From arrival to the refinery, the gold stays in secure hands and on the record. Every handover is signed for.

Two secure-transport staff carrying a sealed steel box between an armoured van and the refinery’s loading bay

03 · Dubai

Carried
under seal

The gold is packed and sealed before it leaves its country. Each seal has a number, and the numbers are written on the shipment’s papers.

In Dubai the shipment is cleared through customs with those papers, then taken by secure transport to the refinery.

At each handover the seals are checked and a receipt is signed. An unbroken seal with the right number shows that nothing was opened on the way.

04 · Assay

Weighed
in the open

At the refinery the gold is weighed, melted and sampled, and the sample is tested in the laboratory. The results are shared in full, and our partner is welcome to have someone watch.

An assay bench: small ceramic cups in a brass rack, and gloved hands lifting a bead of gold with tweezers

04 · Assay

Weighed
in the open

Gold from a mine comes mixed with silver and other metals, and is cast into bars in that state.

At the refinery everything that arrives is weighed, then melted, so that the metal is the same all the way through. Samples are taken from the melt.

Each sample is divided into three parts: one for us, one for the refinery, and one kept aside in case the result is ever questioned and an independent laboratory has to decide.

The laboratory tests the sample by fire assay, the long-established method: a small weighed piece goes through a furnace until only the precious metal is left, and that is weighed again. A spectrometer gives a second reading. The result is the fineness: how much of the metal is gold.

Weight multiplied by fineness gives the fine gold. That is the figure the payment is counted from.

Our partner receives the refinery’s report in full. A partner who wants to see the work done can send someone to be in the room.

After the test the gold is refined: dissolved, parted from the other metals, and recovered at up to 999.9 parts gold in a thousand. It is then cast into bars or grain, which are checked and weighed once more before they leave.

05 · Settlement

Paid
to the gram

Payment follows the fine gold found, on the terms agreed at the start. Our partner sees every figure the sum is built from.

Gloved hands setting a cast gold bar on a balance, three more bars beside it

05 · Settlement

Paid
to the gram

The refinery’s report gives the fine gold in the shipment. The agreement gives the way the price is set. Together they give the amount.

The price of gold changes through every trading day, so the agreement also names the day and the published price that apply.

Our partner receives a statement showing each figure: the weight, the fineness, the price and the sum. Any costs taken from the sum are the ones written into the agreement.

How and where the payment is made is set out in the written terms, and follows the rules of the country the gold comes from.

The trade

Two numbers, settled in the open. Then the rest of the work begins.

The mines