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Jeweller battles counterfeit gold bars
The Sai Gon Jewellery Company (SJC) will modify the design of its gold bars following the discovery of counterfeit bars bearing its imprint in HCM City.
At a press conference held by the company on Thursday, General Director Nguyen Thanh Long said the firm would address concerns over more fake gold bars on the market by working with the authorities to find out who was behind the counterfeiting operation and support consumers who accidentally bought the counterfeited SJC brand gold bars.
"Next month, SJC will modify the technical patterns on our bars to avoid counterfeiting," Long said.
The gold appeared in several jewellery shops in districts 5, Tan Binh and Hoc Mon on Wednesday, Long said.
About 50 – 60 taels of the gold have been discovered in the market in HCM City.
Long said the fake gold bars were either found to be only 95-98 per cent pure gold, instead of the company's standard 99.99 per cent purity, or weighed slightly less than a tael which equals 1.2 troy ounces each.
"At the current price of VND29 million (US$1,497) per tael, customers may lose about VND1 million ($51.28) per tael," he said.
SJC's Deputy General Director Do Cong Chinh said that so far, the company had discovered about 50 counterfeited gold bars with SJC trademarks and serial numbers starting with FA, FH and FF.
Chinh said there were ways to differentiate real SJC gold and the counterfeit one.
The shaved gold taels look smaller than real SJC gold bars, and the sides of the bars are not as smooth.
The words and dragon symbol on the fake bars are slightly blurred and bigger that those of real bars. The weight number on the back of the gold is also not clear.
SJC Director Long said consumers should ask for an invoice containing the series number of the gold to ensure that jewellery shops sell quality gold to customers.
Buyers should alert gold sellers if they believe their gold is counterfeit.
Huynh Trung Khanh, Vice Chairman of Viet Nam Gold Trading Association, said the counterfeit SJC gold has seriously affected the gold branding of SJC, which accounts for 80 per cent of the market in the country.
It has badly affected the gold market in general, Khanh added.
This is the first case of counterfeit SJC gold discovered since SJC branding began, Khanh said.
Khanh said illegally imported gold had been used to make the counterfeit SJC gold.
During the past 20 years, SJC has produced about 15 million gold taels or 600 tonnes of gold. The company has an annual turnover of about US$3 billion and an annual profit of $15.38 million.
vietnamnews
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