A message from Tony Coleman, Director

Our business is still operating

The lockdown has had an impact on our business, with the refining and manufacturing operations temporarily closed during Level 4, meaning we have had to import more gold and silver products than we usually would and are experiencing a backlog in fulfilling orders.

As New Zealand’s only primary dealer for ABCBullion® Australia (a LBMA certified company) we are currently utilising our Trans-Tasman supply line to meet our obligations to our clients and we’re also in the process of comissioning new production equipment which will increase our capacity considerably.

International Shipping Gold

NZ Gold Merchants’ new moulds for the induction vacuum casting bar making furnace (showing 1 Oz gold and 1 Kg silver).

We are receiving deliveries of raw and manufactured gold on a daily basis, as these parcels are small, and we can find freight space.

International Shipping of Silver

Silver is a different story, due to the very limited airfreight available, and the significant weight of the consignments, all the silver we normally import is waiting for freight availability, so we are currently vaulting it in Sydney until supply lines ease. This bottle neck is the major reason we see a longer delay for silver deliveries than gold.

Limited Availability

Many will have noticed our normally extensive range of product offerings has been reduced to a limited offering of Australasian (NZ PURE® and ABCBullion®) products. This is due to European and North American suppliers being impacted by significant production delays and closing their business to new orders while they look to catch up in what can only be seen as a difficult manufacturing environment. We will not look to include any northern hemisphere product until we can purchase “Ex Stock” to reduce risk to our customers. All gold sold by us is 99.99% pure, so please be assured that you will always get quality regardless of brand.

Increased Margins on Gold and Silver

We have experienced increased margins on all gold and silver in the past month, this is due to increased production and delivery costs, together with a wider spread on the precious metals and currencies due to extreme volatility, although these margins are not at their peak, they still persist. If the markets show some normality, we expect these loaded margins to ease.

NZ PURE® Gold and Silver

New Zealand Gold Merchants Ltd is the proud manufacturer of New Zealand’s premier bullion products, and this trademark has been in service since 2006, and before this time the CimeT® trademark was used. We have been manufacturing gold and silver bullion for 45 years and work to consistently bring quality product to the market at competitive prices. Following lockdown, we have a large backlog of orders awaiting manufacture. We have plans in place to mitigate the production delays. New production plant is in the process of being commissioned and this will give us a 500% increase in capacity when fully operational, ensuring we can maintain our competitive margins and reduce future production delays.

Financial Strength

NZ Gold Merchants is well positioned to weather this Covid-19 lockdown – our balance sheet is strong and our cashflow excellent. We are a private company that has reinvested continuously to ensure state of the art production equipment and systems. We foresaw the future in 2008 when we experienced the global financial crisis and started work on building the security that clients would expect of a company working in an industry whose very purpose is look after the financial health of its clients.

Insurance

All gold and silver held on the premises and in transit is fully insured. This includes product stored on behalf in our client vaulting system, as well as the company’s gold and work in progress.

Bricks and Mortar

We are not just an office, a website, and a couple of sales people – we have significant assets; a refinery for processing gold and silver, vacuum manufacturing, assay facilities, a customer vaulting system and the professional people to make it all work.

Delivery Delays

With all I have said to put your mind at ease and help you sleep at night, only holding your gold and silver in your hands will satisfy you.  We will be hampered by delays in delivery and manufacturing because we can only work within the law. Now that we are back at level 3, we are compiling orders and manufacturing the product that we were unable to complete before lockdown. We will keep pushing for freight space to get silver into the refinery so we can get on top of those orders too.

Stock

We usually hold enough stock to meet current delivery obligations (as gold and silver is coming through refining constantly). Like most businesses, when demand surges (especially the size of recent events) we take orders from our clients and have to order additional products form our international suppliers. Silver, due to its value, is pushed back in the production schedule to allow us to focus on gold production first. Going forward, we can expect gold orders to be completed before most silver, so apologies in advance to our silver customers. That said, I understand this was relayed to you at the time of purchase.

Finally

We are in this journey with you; we understand your anxiety and are working diligently to meet the demands placed upon us.

DON’T PANIC, we’re not, we are working to normalise things.

Tony Coleman

Director and Major Shareholder

New Zealand Gold Merchants Limited