I think the refiner idea is brilliant. The younger crowd who have inherited their grandmother's jewellery would certainly find this scheme very attractive provided it has some official gurantees. One also needs to prove that trading in gold is indeed easy and risk free compared with the scrap dealer.
Despite promises, gold trading in India is difficult. One can buy a Swiss bar from ICICI bank but they will not repurchase it. Other jewellers are also reluctant to buy it and one can only exchange it for another piece of jewellery and not cash. This makes investment in gold illiquid.

This reminds me of "India – a golden bird"
(revisit from the Indian impression of last centuries)

I believe Ms. Kapur, in the spirit of euphemistic journalism commonly practiced here in India, has only hinted at an essential aspect of India's love of gold – tax evasion. This spot-exchange is not a new and novel service in India – it's merely an more expensive, less competitive model of the status quo.

Unctuous "Middle-men" exist in India and will continue to charge "hefty commissions" because Indian's would prefer not to pay taxes. A transparent spot exchange would make these assets taxable by the government something almost no one in India wants. The age old Indian art of hiding money under mattresses exists because the middleman might charge 10% while the government could charge 30%.

It might be interesting to imagine the potential ramification to the price of Gold should the Indian gold industry every become fully transparent – but I'm not counting on that happening anytime soon.

The fact of the matter is that the Indians would wake up only to advertisements, no company has ever advertised about buy back of gold and payment for full value of gold content, no cricketer has been roped in to advertise on this market, no company of repute has come out. Reliance, either Anil or Mukesh can come out and their reputation will definitely bring out the gold from the hideouts. that is the only way. Small companies or individuals dont matter to the indians as they have always been cheated by the business men, so only companies of repute can create this change and surely grandmothers and grand fathers would also trus the REliance brand

Sell gold???

Xtra 03/09/2009
Do you see it coming? Did you see it coming? Not a run for cover, YET!
New demand created by BRIC, the 100 of millions of new rich, the ageing effect in west, 60, 70+ years gifts plus silver, gold, diamond marriages and the zero interests. And don’t forget the effect on gold companies income statements. Profits will explode if/when gold hits 1500. Or did I hear 2000, 2500…

2009-07-31
The Pessimist is waiting for a Double Top The Optimist is waiting for a Head&Shoulder reversal buy, a historical brake of the 1000 level and a climax with a bubble!

most ppl dont like to sell gold in india.. even if they are short of moeny, they 'borrow' money, keeping the gold as deposit.. so they can pay back and get the gold.. main reason for gold is – its mandatory for women to wear it during wedding. but these days, women dont care for it much(atleast the ones in cities)..

Good analysis, Tyler.
As it happens in India and equally elsewhere, the vested interests always find a way to make the same or more profit in the new system. The middleman will also evolve new ways. However, I think the article here intends to report what and how a new technology and market channel may change the operations – of course if the consumer wants to embrace that change for their benefit. The subject of tax evasion and the government's poor will to curb tax evasion are here to stay till people wake up – if ever.

Very Recently, there has been a great deal of inquiries by the
American FTC against bloggers and website promoters
for not stating advertising revenue, or existing
relationships with ad networks.

What are your personal ideas about how this could effect
the blog community?

I've been told that India was one of the official storage sites for IMF gold and that they amount they held prior to the purchase was in the neighborhood of 200 Tons.

The Gold Anti Trust Action Committee (GATA) have been speaking to the subject of central bank and by extension IMF gold swap and lease operations that go unreported in the standard gold inventory reports.

Is it possible that this purchase was due to that gold having been leased or swapped or as some say "double sold?"

This subject is deeply important as the world is suffering from a case of spending far too much. And this is the precise reason that the US under Nixon took the world off the Gold Standard. So they could spend way too much.

http://www.duffminster.com/SilverandGodl