Supply & Mining

Affinage refers to the industrial purification and processing of raw precious metals to tradeable or investment-grade fineness levels.

AISC is the gold industry's standardised yardstick for the full cost of keeping a mine running at its present output level.

A historical gold recovery process in which liquid mercury dissolves gold and silver from ore and binds them as an amalgam, which is then separated by heating.

By-product mining refers to the recovery of a precious metal as a by-product of mining another, primarily targeted raw material.

Conflict gold refers to gold mined in war or crisis zones whose proceeds are used to finance armed groups or human rights abuses.

A hydrometallurgical process for gold recovery in which crushed ore is treated with a dilute sodium cyanide solution to selectively dissolve the gold.

Dore bars are pre-refined crude bars of gold and silver, cast directly at mines or smelters and subsequently processed to fine-metal quality at a refinery.

Mine production describes the total quantity of precious metal extracted from ore through mining, whereby the ore grade and the economic minimum content (cut-off) determine which material is mined at all.

The ore grade indicates how many grams of a precious metal (e.g. gold or silver) are contained per tonne of raw ore, and is the most important metric for assessing the economic viability of a mine.

Primary mining refers to the extraction of precious metals directly from the ground through mining, as opposed to secondary recovery from recycled material.

The recycling of precious metals refers to the recovery of gold, silver and platinum-group metals from scrap material such as jewellery, electronic waste and industrial residues through chemical or thermal processing methods.

A refinery separates precious metals from scrap gold, industrial scrap and ores and processes them into high-purity fine metal.

Urban mining refers to the targeted recovery of precious metals and other valuable materials from electronic waste, end-of-life devices and industrial waste streams as a complement to primary mining production.

Two fundamental mining methods in which ores are extracted either in open-pit surface mining (near the surface) or in underground mining (in deep tunnels and shafts).

Fairtrade gold is certified gold from artisanal and small-scale mining that meets social minimum standards, environmental requirements and a binding Fairtrade premium on the market price.