Description

When one considers the purchase of an entire kilogram (2.2 pounds or 32.15 troy ounces) of gold, it is entirely understandable that one would want to know and trust the manufacturer of the product. In the specific case of this 1-kilo gold bar, see details of its 50+ year history below, and know that you can put your trust in the hands of the world’s largest refinery, Valcambi SA of Switzerland.

Like gold bars branded by international financial leader Credit Suisse (for which it refines such products on an exclusive basis), this Valcambi ingot is a masterpiece of elegant simplicity. But this simplicity also speaks of deeper meanings. The obverse of the bar displays the refinery logo, a combination of four equal triangles that create a golden square to evoke Tibetan Mandalas, 18th Century Italian labyrinths, the chessboard and Da Vinci’s drawings of the human figure. It is also meant to represent a stylized 400 oz. LBMA Good Delivery bar, cut diagonally. The front also displays the bar’s weight (1 kg), metal content (fine gold), and purity (999,9), as well as the assayer’s mark and individual serial number. The reverse bears the refinery’s logo in lower case (Valcambi Suisse) on a vertical bias.

ABOUT VALCAMBI REFINERY

Originally incorporated in 1961 by five unidentified Swiss entrepreneurs as Valori & Cambi SA, what was to become the world’s largest gold refinery, located in Balerna, Switzerland, became Valcambi SA when fifty percent ownership was acquired by Credit Suisse. The monumental financial leader purchased another thirty percent stake the following year, and the remaining twenty percent in 1980. In 2003, Credit Suisse sold its 100% control of Valcambi to European Gold Refineries (EGR), which was owned (50%) by Newmont Mining and (50%) by a group of Swiss investors, some of whom were the original 1961 founders of the refinery. Finally, in 2015, the world’s largest gold jewelry manufacturer, Rajesh Exports Ltd. (REL) bought EGR and its full ownership of Valcambi for 400 million dollars in an all-cash deal, financed by none other than Credit Suisse. In addition to its jewelry production facilities, REL also owns gold mines, wholesalers, a retail network and now Valcambi, which refines a reported average of 945 metric tons of gold and 325 metric tons of silver each year.