Posted in Economic

India is not new to gold/silver shopping.

From Google:

The latest figures show Indian families hold approximately 27,871 tons of gold, valued at over $1.5 trillion. This estimate dramatically exceeds the World Gold Council’s July 2023 report that pegged household gold at 25,000 tons.

Let me clarify here that this does not include the temple gold of India which shall be many many times more than the domestic gold held in our families.

https://www.angelone.in/news/economy/indian-household-gold-holdings-surge-to-27871-tons-amid-global-price-rally

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/indias-3-8-trillion-gold-181235837.html

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Surprised by the world headlines screeching that the whale called India swallowed 6000 tons of silver in 2025. Correction: this is annual silver consumption by India for years. In fact in 2022 or 2023, India bought a whopping 7000-8000 tons of silver. Precious metals such as gold and silver are traditionally hoarded by Indian homes along with gems such as diamonds, rubies etc. In fact during a wedding, mostly the brides get entire puja articles in silver as gift from parents. Son-in-law is gifted a silver plate with side plate. Wealthy families have their entire dinner sets in silver. We the middle class mostly limit our silver collection to mere puja articles that may include big plates and flower baskets, apart from tumblers and bowls and cute little storage dabbas for haldi, kumkum etc. Not to leave out the Diyas. We ladies just love having our silver diyas. I got one for my Diya puja here too to middle east along with a smaller one. Some friends especially those with daughters have huge impressive collections of silver. Gold and silver are the real wealth of Indian homes. Its our family custom to invest in appreciable assets be it gold or silver or real estate. India’s hoarded gold is the hugest holding of gold in the world – not only in recent times. Its been so historically.

Our temples even today have tonnes and tonnes of gold, silver and diamonds that does not come into any calculation. This is why from turks to mugals, from British to the Portuguese came to India. Jan 5 by the way was the day Somnath temple was ransacked by Mohammed of Ghazni after a record 17 time failed attempts. The final time he razed the temple, breaking the Jyothirlinga to pieces and looting the temple gold. Over 50,000 Hindus sacrificed their lives fighting to protect one of the 12 Jyothirlingas (Shiva stals) of India. Exactly today PM of India Shri Narendra Modi ji, was at Somnath, as the temple completed 1000 years since 1026 January when it was ransacked and runover completely. Even the shattered pieces of the Jyothirlinga were zealously collected by the Hindus who have tried to reconstruct it recently. The Jyothirlinga of Somnath was a hanging one suspended in air. Can you imagine a levitating huge Shiva Linga in white colour stone? That was precisely Somnath since time immemorial. This stone is NOT FROM PLANET EARTH. To us this establishes already our Lord Shiva as master of the earth. Imagine now what kind of maniacs these marauders of India were to go for Somnath and destroy not only the holy shrine but also loot the temple of the wealth passed on for centuries. That very idea of Shiva/symbol of Hindu Dharma made the turks and mugals go mad that they wanted Somnath completely destroyed. At the base of this destruction also lay the greed for India’s gold. Even today so much looted Hindu wealth in gold and in sculptures lies with United Kingdom, as the British decamped with whatever the Mugals could not lay their hands on. India’s riches invited the marauders, the most violent of them, but then after centuries, see the condition of their native nations today – from Afghanistan to Uzbekistan.

Somnath is just one Hindu temple destroyed by barbaric invaders for our golds and riches. The idea was to batter the very Hindu civilization itself and make it into dust. Well, they failed. This January 1, 2026, this is how Lord Balaji/Venkateshwara of Tirumala gave darshan to thousands of Hindu devotees: all gold and diamonds. And He is a 6 foot deity!

Only ignoramus judge India without knowing about our basics or traumatic history.

I don’t mean the paper gold or paper silver like in the west. I mean the REAL PHYSICAL GOLD, PHYSICAL SILVER THAT INDIA HOLDS. Without physical gold/silver to back up, what are these jokers hoarding in paper.

https://www.brightdigigold.com/digital-gold-blog/the-magnificent-temples-of-india

https://www.khaleejtimes.com/business/indias-hidden-gold-empire-38t-in-homes-plus-billions-more-in-temple-vaults

Sadly, this is what we Indians are left with AFTER THE MUGAL LOOT, TURK LOOT, ETC. After our nation was torn apart for centuries. After the British looted whatever was left including the Kohinoor diamond that principally adorned the crown of Ma Badrakali of the Warangal temple in Andhra Pradesh. And you have these jokers in Pakistan claiming ownership of Kohinoor. But note: no Hindu great grandmothers of theirs taken into mugal harems.

You are talking about the world’s one and only CONTINUOUS AND UNBROKEN CIVILIZATION OF OVER 10,000 YEARS WHICH IS HINDU DHARMIC CULTURE. Our gold,silver and diamond must neither come as surprise nor shock. This is what we are. Landing on the dark side of the moon was not by fluke. It is what we have always been. India is now merely reassembling, reconstructing. We have been through a 1000 year trauma and even today we have CANCER right within that we are fighting to get rid of.

Without a sense of history or basic relevant knowledge, how the world media is making assessment on India’s gold/silver purchases is shocking. Acquired by fair, legal means. Not stolen.

From Google:

India has also historically been the largest consumer of silver jewelry and silverware by volume. Over the past five years, analysts estimate that Indian consumers, particularly low-income individuals in rural areas, have purchased approximately 29,000 tonnes of silver jewelry and 4,000 tonnes of silver coins.

Gold, silver and even diamonds are part of Hindu culture. As simple as that. This is the mark of the real OLD RICH understood? Old rich native nation.

Posted in Economic

Is there oversupply of paper gold as against limited real physical gold ?

Digital gold needs no intro: it is the most happening investment in world markets today making headlines for months now. There is however reportedly, an oversupply of paper gold or digital gold in the world for a while, than actual physical gold in circulation, a point missed by most of us retail investors. Trading/holding stocks in digital gold has made this possible. Holding digital gold is also hassle-free than physical possession. It is said that the ratio of paper gold to physical existing gold in the world could be as skewed as 100:1 or even 250:1. So could this bubble burst anytime crashing the gold markets one fine day? With not enough real gold to back up the digital gold, it is possible that the world economy could be heading towards a crash so far as gold market is concerned. Probably that is why, those like Warren Buffet allegedly keep off digital gold. Digital gold could be a good short term investment than a long term plan, it is said. ETFs seem to be the most favoured platform of gold investment. Owning the physical gold is still the safest way as we know because we are in direct possession of the actual gold that can be stashed away in a vault.

What do I attribute to digital gold working? I, as an Indian housewife, am used to hoarding gold as traditional practice, and don’t fear the fall of the gold prices. But it is true that we women in India hold actual gold in our hands, how much so ever minimum could that be. For us, gold is LIQUIDITY that is matchless. Gold is economic freedom. And gold appreciates maximum, next only to real estate. All these factors make gold the most favoured investment for us ladies. If gold has to crash, then the bubble has to burst in every sector should loans be recalled at short notice, for that matter. World economy will collapse. Just recall housing loan enmasse and see what happens. Domino’s effect. Like a pack of cards, everything has to come crashing in that case. Reality is never the point in the world of economics. How do credit cards work then? Is gold the only bubble waiting to burst? Nations borrow heavily. But I do understand the need to cap the gold market at some point of time. As someone who is in the line of investment averred, gold is not a productive investment and therefore its growth is unnatural. Stocks normally boom when the productivity index improves and quarterly reports show good results. Gold however obeys no such laws. Very much akin to real estate, gold appreciates in value only because of the superficial demand its scarce availability manages to create as against its actual supply. Having said that, a humble housewife/grandma here with no compatible background to post such a comment! But I take the liberty with my half baked info/knowledge!

Can digital gold be realized into real gold? I observed this from a couple of Indian banks. First of all even the leading ones did not have the digital gold platforms that sold 24 k gold gram by gram (or ounce by ounce). ETFs/Gold funds were on offer. But there was this one bank that sold digital gold for a few months which on demand was stated to be deliverable at your doorstep. Product withdrawn from bank services with November end, no wonder! The digital gold sale by ounce did not even last a good six months! Probably the reason is that the bank feared inability to keep up with real supply on demand from customers. However, I see that digital gold sale ounce by ounce is still on offer by a few digital platforms and jewelry houses. The jewelry houses in India cleverly state that your digital gold can be acquired only as gold coins or jewelry from their premises! Well, that means, you can never encash your digital gold at these jewelry houses! In short, by investing in digital gold in these jewelry houses, you are only paying in installments/lumpsum for your future gold purchases! Govt of India and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) do not regulate these platforms trading in digital gold and therefore investment in these platforms may remain risky.

As I see, the govt of India that was issuing sovereign gold bonds for years has since withdrawn the bond issuances from last year! The big headache of paying off the maturing bonds in near future awaits the Indian govt!

Any other info I may glean, I shall update here with.

What do I think about middle class investments in digital gold. I think if you can take the risk, you can afford to invest in digital gold. It still is a great investment – long term investment in my PERSONAL opinion. Its worth the risk, provided you have other investments to bank on, in case of an unprecedented crash. So far world has not witnessed such a debacle, but let us wait and watch.