International Bullion Exchange IIBX: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the 29th of July 2022 launched ‘India International Bullion Exchange (IIBX)’, at the Gujarat International Finance Tec-City (GIFT City) near Gandhinagar, Gujarat.

Key Points:

• IIBX is India’s first international bullion exchange.
• The bullion exchange is expected to facilitate efficient price discovery with the assurance of responsible sourcing and quality, apart from giving impetus to the financialization of gold in India, given that gold is tightly regulated in the country.
• At present, there are nominated banks and agencies which have been approved by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to conduct trade or import gold and sell it to dealers.
• The IIBX with its technology-driven solutions seeks to facilitate the transition of Indian bullion market towards a more organized structure by granting qualified jewelers direct access to import gold directly through the exchange mechanism.

Background:

• The exchange, which was announced in Budget 2020, will sell physical gold and silver.
• The exchange will be open for jewelers with a net worth of Rs 25 crore and above to participate.

Other inaugurations in GIFT-City:

• PM Modi also laid the foundation stone for a Rs 200 crore headquarters building of the International Financial Services Centres Authority (IFSCA).
• He presided over the exchange of memorandums of understanding (MoUs) by IFSCA with foreign regulatory authorities and the Department of Space.
• He launched the NSE IFSC-SGX Connect platform which is a framework between NSE’s subsidiary in GIFT IFSC and Singapore Exchange.

• Through this platform, clients, investors and trading members of SGX who used to trade in NSE listed Indian securities through SGX would now trade in these securities through NSE IFSC.