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Supply and Demand Statistics -World Gold Council - May 21, 2008

With financial markets still reeling from the global credit squeeze and growing inflationary pressures dollar demand for gold reached US $20.9bn in the first quarter of 2008, a 20% increase over the same period in 2007 and more than double the level of four years earlier.  However, tonnage demand for gold at 701 tonnes was down 16% on the same period last year and represents the lowest quarterly figure for five years, according to according to Gold Demand Trends, released on May 20 by World Gold Council (WGC).

The fall in tonnage demand was caused primarily by the sharp rise and unusually high volatility in the gold price, which briefly touched record levels above $1,000/oz in mid-March. The impact of this price rise was felt most keenly in the ‘physical buying’ markets of gold jewellery and coins and bars. Jewellery demand declined 21% year-on-year to 445.4 tonnes, the lowest quarterly level since the early 1990s. Net retail investment demand dropped by 35% to 72.7 tonnes in Q1.

There was a stark contrast in the gold exchange traded fund (ETF) market, however, where a combination of continuing instability in the equities markets, ongoing fears over the dollar and rising inflation, and increased understanding of gold’s investment attributes helped spur demand. Demand for gold ETFs was up 100% on Q1 2007 at 73 tonnes for the quarter - representing $2.2 billion in dollar terms.

Read about Gold Demand Trends in our detailed briefing note, which also includes commentary on supply.

Press release: gold demand hits second-highest quarterly value on record in q1 2008 – but record prices lead to volume decline 

Supply and demand statistics files

End-use consumption (tonnes)This provides details of jewellery consumption, industrial and dental fabrication, and all categories of investment which are statistically identifiable.

End-use consumption ($m) Similar information in US dollars.

Supply and demand (tonnes) In addition to a summary of demand information this also shows the categories of supply: mine output, net hedging or de-hedging by mining companies, scrap and net central bank sales.

Notes and copyright information

Notes: Source: Tonnage data are GFMS Ltd. Value data are WGC calculations based on GFMS data.
Notes: 1. Identifiable end-use consumption excluding central banks. 2. Provisional . 3. “Other retail” excludes bar and primary coin offtake; it represents mainly activity in North America and Western Europe. 4. Exchange Traded Funds and similar products including: LyxOR Gold Bullion Securities, Gold Bullion Securities (Australia), streetTRACKS Gold Shares, NewGold Gold Debentures, iShares Comex Gold Trust, ZKB Gold ETF, GOLDIST, Central Fund of Canada and Central Gold Trust.

© Copyright 2008 World Gold Council and GFMS Ltd. All rights reserved.

Data on the supply and demand for gold are compiled by GFMS Ltd. The company provides a number of tables exclusively for the World Gold Council. Please refer to the notes and copyright information for details regarding the restrictions on disseminating these data. GFMS should be contacted for further information or for historical data. In addition, certain data are available on Bloomberg.