The International Monetary Fund has given the go ahead to the use of USD$2.7 billion in profits from gold sales to ramp up financial assistance to developing economies.
Gold prices are set to a receive a major boost from their adoption by banks are a core asset if the world's leading banking regulatory authority opts to raise their asset status.
British bank Barclays opened its first precious metals vault on the outskirts of London that caters to institutional investors, sovereign-wealth funds, central banks and commercial banks.
Harmony Gold says the Wafi-Golpu deposit in PNG could support a $9.8 billion mine with peak annual production of 560,000 gold ounces and 335,000 tonnes of copper.
The counter is up 25% since July 25 when news first emerged that Indonesia has "requested" 51% of Grasberg, the world's largest gold and number three copper mine.
Colombia's booming mining and oil industries are likely to be the centre of terrorist attacks over the coming months as soldiers and guerrillas fight on the battlefield, while their delegations hold peace talks to end the country's half-century-old conflict.
Only five months after Google’s billionaire co-founders and filmmaker James Cameron officially launched their asteroid mining focused Planetary Resources company, the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is funding a study to evaluate how viable the endeavour really is.
Hedge funds have placed major bets on silver due to expectations that the precious metal will outpace gold in the wake of expansionary measures by the world's central banks.