Many shops on famous gold trading streets like Nguyen Duy Duong and An Duong Vuong (District 5), Ban Co and Nguyen Dinh Chieu (District 3) resumed their operation yesterday afternoon after their close that morning for fear of being checked and severely fined (of up to hundreds of millions of VND) by the functional agencies.
However, consumers wholeheartedly support this check as they are annoyed by untransparent gold trading activities of various shops. Le Thi Anh Lan from District 3 shared that a number of shops only give their customers simple gold trading receipts lacking a lot of useful information. Some even refuse to specify the gold price, weight, and origin of the product on the receipt while these data should have been clearly written to ensure customer rights.
The HCMC Market Management Department confirmed with SGGP Newspaper a citywide check on gold retailers and a propaganda campaign to raise the awareness of gold businesses and shop owners about applicable laws related to gold-related businesses.
After checking, the functional agencies detected that several shops are selling gold jewelry with no clear origin, invoices, or labels. They even discovered gold merchandise like earrings, pendants, bracelets faking famous brand names such as Chanel, Versace, Cartier.
The prices of gold yesterday were significantly unstable, reaching a peak of VND85.5 million (US$3,384) per tael then gradually falling to VND 84.1 million ($3,328) for selling and VND82.1 million ($3,250) for buying after the news that the Vietnam State Bank is going to host gold bar auctions. The price of 9999 gold rings also witnessed a moderate rise to VND75.18 million ($2,975) for buying and VND76.88 million ($3,042) for selling.
The price of gold on the Kitco platform was at $2,350,5/ounce (equal to VND71.4 million per tael – a gap of VND12,7 million ($503) per tael as opposed to domestic prices), a rise of $10 compared to the previous trading session.
The exchange rate yesterday between US$-VND at the Vietnam State Bank was 24,096, an increase of VND14 compared to the end of last week. The floor and ceiling exchange rates applied for commercial banks were VND22,892-25,300. The dollar buying and selling rates at free market were VND25,450 and 25,550.
