India's gold imports set to increase as more people buy gold

A senior World Gold Council official has suggested that the likely response to augmenting demand for gold bullion in India will be an increase in gold imports.

According to Reuters, Ajay Mitra, managing director of the India office of the World Gold Council, believes India's gold imports will rise in the three months to December as a consequence of investors' greater interest in gold.

Rather than keep money in potentially risky stocks, investors are seeing gold as a safe haven as financial markets are affected by a crisis of confidence.

"People are scared and have started to think about putting some money in gold," Ajay Mitra told the news provider at the World Gold Council today (Wednesday, October 15th).

India's gold imports are already on the up after a slow start to the year caused by high prices.

While gold imports fell by 50 per cent in the first six months of the year, preliminary figures suggest the trend was reversed in 2008's third quarter.

Mr Mitra also predicted that demand for gold would intensify during Diwali festival.

"We are optimistic. We see good improvement value-wise but cannot say in terms of volume," he told the India Economic Times.

Researching your first Gold Investment today? Don't pay more than you should! Make it cheap, simple & ultra-secure at BullionVault...