Ownership of Gold Bullion Securities products on London and Australian Stock Exchanges is transfering to ETF Securities this month. Gold Bullion Holdings has agreed to sell to ETF Securities management and control of its Gold Bullion Securities products, including the Lyxor Gold Bullion Securities product, which is listed on the London Stock Exchange, Euronext Paris, Borsa Italiana and the Deutsche Boerse; and the Australian listed Gold Bullion Securities product. Under the agreement, the two products will be marketed with the ETFS suite of exchange traded commodities (ETCs). Although the name will change to ETFS Gold Bullion Securities the exchange codes will remain the same.

The sale and purchase is subject to certain regulatory consents and the parties anticipate the transaction will be completed very shortly. They stressed it will involve no changes to any of the operations and will not impact investors in the securities in any way.

“The acquisition of these two gold ETCs demonstrates our commitment to be the leading provider of exchange traded commodities,” said Graham Tuckwell, chairman of ETF Securities. “These products will fit well within our commodities platform and will be part of an expanded marketing effort for gold products in particular.”

As the world’s first two gold ETFs, GBS and GOLD have played an instrumental role in the development of the allocated, physically-backed, gold ETF market, which now represents more than 780 tonnes of global gold demand. The GBS securities are currently marketed by Lyxor and the parties have commenced discussions with Lyxor on the most suitable arrangements for the marketing and branding to be changed over to ETF Securities.

Since the launch of these first gold ETFs some five years ago, most of the same management team and directors have gone on to establish ETF Securities, which is now the leading exchange traded commodity (ETC) firm in Europe, with more than 120 ETCs listed on five exchanges and more than $6 billion in assets.

As of 25 June 2008 holdings in the London product were $3.3bn or 115 tonnes of gold and holdings in the Australian product were $0.3bn or 11 tonnes of gold. The World Gold Council said it will continue to support ETF Securities in the marketing of gold as part of its remit to promote investment demand for gold.