Gold Bullion Storage Opened by Deutsche Bank in Singapore

INCREASED gold bullion demand has led Deutsche Bank to open a 200-tonne gold storage facility in Singapore.

Using the Singapore Freeport facilities, the world's largest bank by assets will meet gold bullion customers' main worry – the safety of their gold, it says – and care for up to $9 billion worth of metal.

Singapore is perceived as a reliable and safe place for gold, says Mark Smallwood, Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management's head in the Asia-Pacific region for wealth planning. The bank's new Singapore gold vault facilities are already seeing strong demand from its customers, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Currently seeing 2% of the world's gold bullion trade on government estimates, Singapore last October abolished a 7% goods and services tax on gold and precious metals with the aim of raising that share to 10 or 15% over the next 10 years.

This new gold facility, operated inside the Singapore Freeport warehouse – and leased from custody specialists Malca-Amit, according to MineWeb – adds to Deutsche Bank's existing vaults in London, Zurich and New York.

Deutsche Bank sees Singapore as offering "complementary custody" and a "trading platform to the traditional hubs" Smallwood says.

The Singapore Freeport was opened in 2010. Non-bank providers BullionVault began offering gold and silver storage to its customers earlier in 2013.