Gold bullion production is largely governed by the LBMA Responsible Sourcing Programme. In addition, seals such as “Fairtrade Gold”, “Green Gold” and “Auropelli Responsible Gold” identify gold sourced from emission-friendly and thus sustainable production. A lack of uniform criteria and market standard still impede the assessment of gold in terms of sustainability, causing divergent classifications by different suppliers.

More information on the subject can be found here.

Refined gold in its first life cycle and not directly sourced from a mine is considered “recycled”. In practice, recyclable material includes consumer products, scrap and waste metals, materials generated in the refining and product manufacturing process, scrap gold in the form of jewellery or gold bars, and products containing gold. It is the aim of DBCo to deliver as many bars of recycled gold as possible and thus contribute to a growing share of recycled gold in the market. The primary partner of DBCo in achieving this goal is Umicore, a specialist company for state-of-the-art recycling technologies.

More information on the subject is available here.

In urban mining, gold is extracted for recycling from sources primarily available in urban areas: smartphones, tablets, PCs and motor vehicles. While the recycling rate for scrap gold such as jewellery is already at 100 per cent, gold recovery through urban mining is currently the recycling sector with the greatest growth potential.

Like green gold, green mining is not a precisely defined, standardised term. It generally describes the greatest possible consideration of all ESG criteria in the extraction of gold across the entire value chain. Specifically, this means an environmentally friendly development of gold mines and extraction while respecting human and employee rights (in particular with regard to health, the prevention of forced or child labour, and fair pay). It also requires the production process to cause the lowest possible CO2 emissions in all stages, from extraction to trade. Green mining must therefore always be based on gold recycling, as CO2 emissions from scrap gold recovery amount to less than one-twentieth of the CO2 emissions generated by traditional mining of the same amount of gold.

Investment gold, stored in vaults of gold banks, central banks, stock exchanges and refineries in the form of bullions or coins, which can be proven with a verifiable date to have been deposited before 1 January 2012, is referred to as grandfathered gold. It requires no proof of origin and includes third-party holdings on behalf of the specified companies. While it is impossible to certify responsible sourcing in compliance with ESG criteria for grandfathered gold, DBCo makes every possible effort to share all available information.

The LBMA is the international trade association and most important wholesale over the counter trading venue for gold and silver. It sets the stringent criteria for the traded gold in its Good Delivery Rules and Governance, ensuring efficient trading of the standardised LBMA Good Delivery bars. The LBMA is an essential partner for DBCo. 
For more information, please visit the website LBMA. 

A circular economy is a regenerative system in which resource use and waste production, emissions and energy waste are minimised by slowing down, reducing and closing energy and material cycles. This can be achieved in many ways, including recycling.

The World Gold Council is a global lobby organisation for the gold mining industry, based in London. The organisation aims to stimulate and maintain gold demand. Together with the London Bullion Market Association (LBMA), it works to develop and implement an international system ensuring the integrity of origin of gold bullion and to control the chain of custody.

More information is available here.

The responsible use of raw materials is a high priority for DBCo and its investors. An important cooperation partner of DBCo is Umicore AG & Co. KG, producer of precious metal ingots in the company’s own recycling plant, one of the world’s largest precious metals recycling facilities. Umicore recovers up to 18 valuable precious metals from devices such as mobile phones or laptops at the end of their life cycle, creating a closed loop through which the company contributes to the conservation of resources. Instead of 200 tonnes of natural ores, Umicore thus requires only four tonnes of discarded mobile phones to produce a standard-quality 1 kg gold bullion through its recycling process. The company produces around 100 tonnes of gold annually from scrap gold and electronic waste.

More information is available on the company website.

Most of the physical gold holdings of DBCo are deposited in the Frankfurt vaults of Clearstream Banking AG, a wholly owned subsidiary of Deutsche Börse AG.