Recently, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation broke the news that the famous Perth Mint located in the country’s Western Australia state was suspected of selling hundreds of tons of gold bars that did not meet the requirements of China’s Shanghai Gold Exchange to China, and also concealed it from the Chinese side. this situation.
Judging from the introduction of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the Perth Mint, which was exposed to this scandal, has a long history of opening – it can be traced back to the 19th century, and at the same time it is one of the largest mints in the world today, so this is not only It has made the mint a famous tourist attraction in Australia, and it has enjoyed a good reputation all over the world.
However, in 2018, the mint began diluting gold bars with impurities in order to “save money”. The doped impurities are mainly silver and copper.
According to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the practice of the Perth Mint, although accepted by the industry, is not illegal in itself, but because the mint also has to maintain its 99.99% gold purity, it is not only a violation of its craftsmanship. The requirements are very high, and there is also a lot of quality control risk.
As a result, in 2021, the Shanghai Gold Exchange in Shanghai, China, discovered that two gold bars manufactured by the Perth Mint had excessive impurities.
Specifically, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported that although the purity of the two gold bars was 99.99%, although the purity of the gold was fine, because the Shanghai Gold Exchange had higher requirements for impurities, silver impurities were found in the two gold bars. Content exceeded the limit.
After the Shanghai Gold Exchange complained about the matter to the Perth Mint, the Perth Mint’s investigation found that one of the two gold bars had actually been found to be defective by the Mint. The Mint also found that it might not be just one or two bars that went wrong, but possibly as many as 100 tons – because these bars have all been produced through a doping and dilution process since 2018.
This also means that if you choose to tell the Shanghai side the truth, the Perth Mint will have to recall these gold bars on a large scale. According to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, this not only means that the mint has to spend up to billions of Australian dollars to buy back substandard gold bars from Chinese buyers, but also needs to transport these gold bars from China to Perth for remelting. , the cost will be enormous. At the same time, the company will also lose its reputation and market.
As a result, the leadership of the Perth Mint decided to hide the situation from the Shanghai Gold Exchange, the mint’s largest customer, and then stopped the operation of doped and diluted gold bars, while telling the Shanghai side that except for the two Gold bars and other subsequent gold production are eligible.
After completing this series of deceitful operations, the CEO of the Mint, Richard Hayes, soon announced that he would retire early due to illness.
Although the internal documents from the Perth Mint obtained by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation have exposed the scandal that seriously damaged the reputation of the Mint and even Australia, the Mint actually shifted the responsibility to China in an interview, saying that China’s Due to the restriction order on gold export, the Shanghai Gold Exchange did not return the two gold bars it considered unqualified, so the Mint could not verify the matter.