Rand Refinery Short $113 Million in Physical Gold

Bloomberg reported Friday that after adopting a new computer system, Rand Refinery Ltd. found it has $113 million less physical metal than is recorded in its accounts. The company is blaming “implementation difficulties” on the discrepancy.

As quoted in the market news:

Rand Refinery’s shareholders, including AngloGold Ashanti Ltd., Sibanye Gold Ltd. and Harmony Gold Mining Co., agreed to lend the company 1.2 billion rand to help make up the difference. Howard Craig resigned as chief executive officer in May and has been replaced by Mark Lynam, who is being assisted by management consultant Accenture Plc in sorting out the issue.

Gold miners send bullion at about 80 percent purity to the refinery, which then treats it and boosts this to close to 100 percent. Rand, Africa’s biggest processing facility for the metal, has refined almost 50,000 metric tons of gold since 1920, according to its website.

The miners, customers of the refinery, have received the prices they were expecting, leading them to conclude it’s most likely an accounting problem rather than theft, James Wellsted, a spokesman for Sibanye Gold, said by phone.

Click here to read the full Bloomberg report.