Data gathered by Learnbonds.com indicates that revenue from the Chinese retail trade of precious metals has dropped by 47%. The slump in revenue from the trade of gold, silver, and jewelry mainly occurred between January and March this year.
According to the data, by the end of March 2020, the revenue was $2.08bn (14.72bn yuan) while revenue for January and February combined was $3.92bn (27.72bn yuan). This was a growth of 3.4% from December 2019’s $3.79bn (26.79bn yuan).
In March last year, the revenue was $3.09bn (21.82bn yuan), which declined to $2.62m (18.55bn yuan). At the end of May, the income bounced back to $3.11bn (22.01bn yuans) which later slightly dropped to $3.08bn (21.79bn yuan) in June. July recorded the lowest revenue in 2019 at $2.47bn (17.49bn yuan).
The figures later rose to $3bn (21.24bn yuan) in August. In September, October, and November the revenue stood at $2.89bn (20.47bn yuans), $2.81bn (19.86bn yuan) and $3bn (21.2bn yuans) respectively.
The declining revenue at the start of this year is one of the direct impacts of the coronavirus pandemic when China was placed on lockdown. As a result, most retail centers like malls closed down in a bid to curb the spread. According to the report:
“Many experts believe unless the coronavirus pandemic has been fully contained, there won’t be any physical demand for precious metals in China. It’s a blow to many retailers as they had stocked precious metals in January.”
The data also overviewed countries with most gold reserves and China occupies the seventh position globally with 69.24m ounces. The United States holds the top spot with 296.87m. Other top gold holders include Germany (118.67m ounces), IMF (99.24m ounces), Italy (86.47m ounces), France (85.91m ounces), Russia (89.36m ounces), Switzerland (36.67m ounces), Japan (26.97m ounces) and India (22m ounces).
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