India's September gold bill soars to 15-month high
By GCRU Gold News on Friday, October 10 2014, 01:35 - Permalink
The stocking up of gold by retailers and traders resulted in sharp surge in Indian gold imports during the last week of September, lifting the month’s total gold import bill to highest during the past 15 months. The sharp fall in gold prices and the anticipated huge demand for the yellow metal during festive season led to higher gold imports.
The Sep ’14 gold import bill totaled $3.5-4 billion, the highest since May ’13 when the import bill had totaled $7.6 billion. On a year-on-year basis, the gold import bill witnessed a jump of nearly 500%.
Premium trading houses are believed to have purchased huge quantities of gold during end-September. The higher gold imports are on account of maintaining sufficient stock levels to meet rise in demand during festive and wedding season. However, gold retailers and traders stated that huge jump in gold imports is not attributed to increased gold demand. According to them, demand remained extremely subdued, despite cheap gold prices.