Expensive gold cuts jewellery sales

People are hesitant to buy jewellery because of soaring local gold prices, jewellers and traders said.

Jewellery sales at the five-day Vietnam Jewellery Fair that ended on Sunday are estimated at a significant 12 billion dong (US$760, 000), said an executive from the business department of Saigon Jewellery Holding Co (SJC).

SJC alone sold as much as 2.5 billion dong worth of jewellery, he said.

However, the figures would have been much greater if local gold prices were not as high as it had been in the past few days, he said. “Most exhibitors told us that the sharply rising gold prices really affected their sales.”

SJC organised the annual event in cooperation with the World Gold Council.

An executive of Phu Nhuan Jewellery Joint-Stock Co (PNJ) said jewellery sales at his company were also not as substantial as expected. “People are hesitant to buy jewellery although it is the peak season for jewellery consumption. It is because gold has become much more expensive.”

However, some gold traders said they sold a lot of gold bars because people thought it was good to buy gold before the yellow metal continued to rise.

Local gold on November 21 leapt to an all-time high of 9.22 million dong per tael, or 1.2 troy ounces, from around 9.02 million dong over the weekend.

This followed a strong surge in global markets, where it was trading around US$490 per troy ounce, compared to US$486.7 on Saturday.

 

Category: Business