Gold Fixing

Gold Fixing

Gold Fixing, also known as Gold Fix or the London Gold Fixing, is the procedure used by the members of the London Gold Pool in order to set the price of gold. There are many different reasons that the Gold Fixing exists. The main reason it was designed for the London bullion market in order to allows its members to fix a price for setting contracts. However, there has been man other uses to it. For instance, informally the Gold Fixing is used throughout the world’s markets for creating a benchmark for pricing gold products and or derivatives. The process of the Gold Fixing is done twice everyday at 10:30 GMT and 15:00 GMT by telephone.

The first fixing happened amongst five members of the bullion that traded gold and took place on September 12, 1919. The five men were Sharps Wilkins, Mocatta & Goldsmid, Samuel Montagu & Co., Pixley & Abell, and NM Rothschild & Sons. The price of gold when these men took place in the first fixing was around 4 pounds 18 shillings and nine pence per troy ounce. The gold fixing has been used for a long time as a standard for pricing gold; however there have been times when the fixing was unable to operate. For example, during the wartime emergencies, The London Gold Fixing was suspended between 1939 and 1954. However this didn’t stop it from becoming what is still used today as a benchmark for the pricing of gold across the world in all markets. Today the gold fixing prices are fixed in three currencies, Pound sterling (GBP), European Euros (EUR), and United States dollars (USD). If you are interested in getting more information about the Gold Fixing, there are many great resources online that will allow you to quickly do so.