Situated in Shanghai’s Global Harbor shopping mall, the machine has been drawing in long lines in recent weeks, with customers having to make bookings for days in advance to use the service.
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Kinghood Group’s Smart Gold Store in Shanghai. Photo by Shenzhen Kinghood Group |
Users need to insert their gold jewelry, which will be weighed, melted, and examined. They will receive cash in return.
For example, a user inserted a 40-gram gold necklace into the ATM and received a payout of CNY36,000 (US$4,988) within 30 minutes, according to China Times.
Managed by Shenzhen’s Kinghood Group, the ATM, part of the company’s Smart Gold Store concept, accepts gold items over 3 grams with at least 50% purity.
The recycling involves identity checks, melting at over 1,000°C, and a second purity assay. A CNY18 yuan (US$2.50) per gram service fee is applied.
Xie Chengcheng, Kinghood’s Shanghai operations manager, told China Times the company aims to install over 100 gold ATMs in Shanghai, with units already in Beijing, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Hong Kong.
Since last year, Kinghood expanded Smart Gold Stores to 40 Chinese cities, placing them in banks, supermarkets, and retail shops to bolster its retail business.
The ATM has disrupted traditional gold-buying, with local “gold scalpers” and small buyers reporting losses due to the ATM’s efficiency and transparency. Some cited reduced cash flow and inability to compete with the ATM’s speed.
On April 16, when the Shanghai ATM debuted, gold prices hit record highs, enabling long-term gold holders to sell at exceptional rates.
The Shanghai Gold Exchange reported real-time prices above CNY788 yuan ($108) per gram.
“The introduction of smart gold ATMs primarily serves a recycling function from a business perspective,” Xu Weixin, from the Shanghai Gold Association, told local media.
This reflects the fact that, with rising gold prices, the value of gold held by the public has increased significantly, leading to a stronger desire to cash out, he added.
Xu cautioned against hasty sales, advising, “not rush into selling their gold holdings” and to consider retaining them longer as there is still potential for further increases.
