Source: Bloomberg
Sybilla Gross
The price of gold in China near the Spring Festival is high, but consumers still find many reasons for buying it.
Although the holiday season usually promote the increase in consumption such as gold jewelry, the demand reports this year are still noticeable, because it happens to happen at the same time as the stock market plummeted.As a world -renowned preservation tool, gold is getting new fans, including the favor of young buyers.
A consumer working in the financial area of Shanghai Lujiazui said that he spent thousands of yuan this week to buy a gold necklace for his girlfriend as a gift for the Spring Festival and Valentine's Day.
"I wanted to buy a necklace of a luxury brand before, but I thought about it, but I bought gold jewelry because it had investment value," said the consumer named Zhuge.
Although the Chinese economy has been in trouble due to the long -lasting real estate crisis, gold, silver and jewelry sales have been very hot for several months.In December last year, the retail sales of gold and silver jewelry hit a six -year high.
"" Due to the lack of alternatives, and compared with a few years ago, it becomes more difficult to transfer funds out of China to invest in other places in China, which is definitely helpful for gold prices. "Kavalis said.
The international market has a strong gold price, stabilized above $ 2,000 per ounce, not far from historical highs. It has received concerns about the conflict of the Middle East and the expected support for Western interest rates to begin to fall soon.According to the data of MKS PAMP Group, the gold price near the Spring Festival is the most expensive in history.
In addition, as the main importer, China's domestic gold prices are usually higher than international gold prices, and the relatively weak RMB has also increased the cost of buying gold for consumers.
Looking at the dim
"The prospects of China's real estate and the stock market are very sluggish," said Zhang Ting, an analyst at Tianfu Bank of Sichuan."Investors will naturally turn to relatively conservative assets such as gold."He said that sales should remain high for a period of time.
Consumers are rushing to expensive goods such as gold to seek value preservation, indicating that many people think that the economic situation has deteriorated.But this also reflects that the industry is improving product design to attract new consumer groups.
Metals Focus Kavalis said that gold jewelry, which has been regarded as outdated, is now attracting young people's interest.
28 -year -old lawyer Christina Qi said that today's design is more avant -garde.She recently bought a golden bracelet for her husband as a birthday and New Year gift.She said that many of her friends also bought similar products as investment.
