OLD GOLD TRADE.

Thames Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 20419, 22 September 1938, Page 3

OLD GOLD TRADE.

RUSH TO SELL ENDED, DEALERS OUT OF BUSINESS. OPINION IN SYDNEY. The old gold trade, which boomed a few years ago when the price of g?lc' soared, has now slumped, and many dealers have had to go out of business. Gold-buyers say that most of the old jewellery which had no sentimental value to the owners has now be-an bought.

Few sovereigns are now being offer ed in exchange for paper money nominally worth more than twice as much. The gold-buyer of a leading firm of city jewellers said recently that, although banks were now offering £2 1/4 each for sovereigns, •there 'had been no rush of sellers.

“The gold-buying business is dead,” he said. “Although we offer a fair price for disused jewellery, we are often told by sellers that they can do better elsewhere. If that is so, tlio dealers who are offering higher prices are making little profit. Many dealers have gone out of business. "We are offered one or two sovereigns a week, but since the law prohibits a defacing of coins they are not as acceptable as gold jewellery and, in fact, a better price than we could offer can always be obtained at the Commonwealth Bank.”