IMF says it got 'good price' for gold from India

Lalit K Jha
Washington, Nov 4 (PTI) The International Monetary Fund,
which sold 200 tonnes of gold for about USD 6.7 billion to the
Reserve Bank of India, on Wednesday said it got a "good
price," and wants to be similarly "lucky" in the next phase
sale of the precious metal.
The sale price of gold to the RBI is expected to be under
USD 1,045 per ounce, nearly USD 200 per ounce higher than what
it would have been anticipated in mid-September, a senior IMF
official told reporters in a teleconference.
When the IMF Executive Board at its meeting on September
18 announced to sell 403.3 tonnes of gold -- one-eighth of the
Fund's total holding –- the prevailing market price of the
bullion at that time was about USD 850 an ounce.
"Obviously, it's a good price relative to the original
assumptions," the IMF official said.
The IMF, in pursuance of the decisions taken at the G-20
summit in London, had decided to sell about 403.3 tonnes of
gold to shore up its finances so that it can lend money to the
poor countries at concessional rates.
"Of course, this is only half the sale that we have
completed, so we don't want to get ahead of ourselves. We
still have another half to go. I hope we'll still be lucky,"
he said.
The official said the good price received for its gold
from India would certainly help the multilateral lending
agency to meet its target of stepping up financing to poor
countries. PTI LKJ
JVN