Hycroft Mining Holding Corp (HYMC)

[bobhwang]

As we can see, Hong Kong received the most gold bullion from the U.S. at a total of 214 mt, followed by Switzerland at 150 mt and the U.K. at nearly 29 mt. Thus, the top three countries imported 393 mt (80%) of the total 488 mt exported in 2013.

Some interesting data points to look at were the 27 mt imported by Thailand and 11 mt China received in 2013. If the majority of U.S. gold exported to Hong Kong and Switzerland made its way to China and other Eastern countries, we can assume that nearly 75% of total U.S. gold exports went to East… with the majority going to the Chinese.

The huge wholesale buying of gold by the Chinese in 2013, put a big damper on U.S. gold imports. Koos Jansen at InGoldWeTrust stated that total Chinese wholesale gold demand was 2197 mt in 2013. According to Koos, this did not include Peoples Bank of China purchases which may have put the total at 2,500 mt.

As the U.S. struggles to maintain its domestic gold production, mine supply fell from 234 mt in 2012 to 231 mt in 2013. This may not seem like much of a decline, but if we look at a longer dated chart…. the U.S. peaked in gold production in 1998 at 366 mt.