Reliance Money sells 200kg of gold

Reliance Capital subsidiary Reliance Money has sold 200 kilograms worth of gold since it launched last month, Reuters reports.

The firm managed to sell 20,000 eight-gram coins, as well as 8,000 five-gram coins since May 3rd, leaving the management stunned by the consumer uptake.

"The sales have exceeded our expectations," said the company's chief executive, Sudip Bandyopadhyay. "We exhausted all that we had stocked."

Now Reliance Money has ordered a further 50,000 coins that will be sold through Reliance World and Reliance Money outlets.

"Our biggest challenge is to create the positioning that Reliance outlets also sell gold coins," said Bandyopadhyay - the branches mainly sell communications and financial services products.

Reliance Money aims "to change the way India trades in financial markets". It believes that offering gold coins to investors in small towns will provide a popular alternative to buying jewelry.

According to World Gold Council figures, India imported 211 tonnes of gold between January and March this year - an increase of 50 per cent year-on-year.