Process

Before anything else, and before any material moves. The counterparty is identified as a company, its beneficial owners are established and documented, and both are screened against sanctions and politically exposed persons lists.

On the doré side this extends to the authorisation to mine and to export, and to the origin record for the material itself. A counterparty that cannot produce these does not reach step two. The full standard is on the sourcing standards page.

Quantity, quality basis, the assay that settlement will be based on, the pricing basis, the allocation of transport cost and risk, and the payment terms. All of it in writing, and all of it before shipment.

The point of fixing this first is that nothing has to be negotiated while metal is in the air.

The export declaration, the authorisation it rests on, and the origin record are assembled in the country of departure and checked before the shipment is released.

A document issued after the movement it records is not evidence on its own. It counts once the authority that issued it confirms it, and the confirmation goes into the file beside it. What is not accepted is a gap that rests on an account rather than on a record.

Transport is arranged with a specialist carrier and insured for the full value. The route is fixed in advance and is one that can be described: no unexplained stopovers, no change of carrier that nobody documented.

Each handover is receipted. The chain of custody is continuous or the shipment does not move.

The material is entered into the United Arab Emirates under Velcura’s licence and delivered to the refinery. The customs entry closes the gap between the export declaration at the other end and the intake record here.

The refinery melts and assays the material and issues a certificate stating weight and fineness. That certificate, and not the counterparty’s declaration, is what the position settles against.

Where the result differs materially from the declaration, the contract says what happens next. That is agreed at step two, when neither side knows which way the difference will go.

Settlement follows the assay certificate and the pricing basis agreed in the contract. The statement sets out the calculation in full: weight, fineness, price basis, deductions and the resulting amount.

Payment is normally made within 48 hours of the assay report. That is the rule the sequence is built around, not a guarantee: it holds once the preceding steps are complete, and a step that is waiting on a document moves it.

The file is then closed and retained. It contains the counterparty review, the contract, the export and import declarations, the transport documents, the assay and the settlement statement — a chain that can be read end to end by someone who was not present for any of it.