Does all the World’s #gold pass through Canton Ticino?

Bars, refineries and the truth behind the numbers

Three #refineries a few kilometres from the Italian border turn hundreds of tonnes of gold a year into bars that end up in vaults around the world. Here is how it happened, how much Switzerland really weighs in the market, and why Ticino’s gold made headlines over the past two years

 Whether Switzerland’s share is 34% or 70%, one fact stands: if you are holding a bar stamped “Suisse”, chances are it was born within a few kilometres of each other, between Chiasso and Mendrisio. A small border valley that has been melting down the dreams (and fears) of half the planet for sixty years.

An industry born on the border

If the Mendrisiotto is one of the world’s capitals of the gold bar, the reason – as Valcambi itself explains – is mostly historical: in the 1970s and 1980s Italy was the world’s top jewellery producer and sourced its refined gold in Ticino. The cluster effect did the rest: the three big Ticino refineries are less than 4.5 kilometres apart as the crow flies and, according to swissinfo, in 2024 three out of four Valcambi employees commuted across the border from Italy.

The Ticino players

Valcambi (Balerna). Founded on 15 May 1961 as Valori & Cambi – literally “exchange of valuables” – by five private entrepreneurs from the Mendrisiotto, it took its current name in 1967, the year Credit Suisse acquired 50%. It joined the London Good Delivery list in 1968. US miner Newmont arrived in 2003, India’s Rajesh Exports took over in 2015, and today the company belongs to Global Gold Refineries. It is regarded as the world’s largest precious-metals refinery, with an estimated capacity of 1,400 to 1,600 tonnes of gold a year, and claims to have been the first to produce a minted gold bar.

Argor-Heraeus (Mendrisio). Founded in Chiasso in 1951 as Argor SA and owned by UBS, it opened its refinery in Mendrisio; in 1986 it merged with Germany’s Heraeus and since 2017 it has been wholly owned by the Hanau-based group. A new plant completed in 2012 nearly doubled its output.

PAMP (Castel San Pietro). Founded in 1977, it became one of the most recognisable bar brands in the world, helped by the entry in 1981 of Mahmoud Kassem Shakarchi, the founder of MKS. In November 2021 it merged with MKS (Switzerland) SA, the Geneva-based precious-metals trading group, creating MKS PAMP.

And Metalor? The only major Swiss refinery outside Ticino is in Neuchâtel: it has existed since 1852 as Martin de Pury & Cie and since 2016 has belonged to Japan’s Tanaka Kikinzoku. Three of the five LBMA “referees” in charge of quality control for refined gold are Swiss: PAMP, Argor-Heraeus and Metalor.

The percentages: how “Swiss” is the world’s gold?

The most repeated figure is “70% of the world’s gold passes through Switzerland”.

Is it true? It depends on who says it and what is being measured. Here are the main estimates side by side:

Indicator	Value	Source
World gold refined in Switzerland “in an average year”	~70%	MKS spokesperson (swissinfo)
World refining capacity held by Swiss refineries	65–70%	BullionStar, quoted by US Gold Bureau (2017)
Share of refined gold worldwide in 2023	34%	SECO, via AFP
Estimate including recycled and informal-sector gold	one-third to one-half	swissinfo
LBMA referees based in Switzerland	3 out of 5	swissinfo
Major Swiss refineries located in Ticino	3 out of 4	swissinfo
Gold processed by the three Ticino refineries (2020)	~1,500 t/year, about one-third of world supply	Mining.com

 Why such different numbers? Refineries are mainly service providers: they receive gold from clients and bring it to the required purity. What “passes through” them (including re-melts of existing bars) is not the same as the gold mined in a year, and the estimates probably also move with the market cycle.

An honest way to put it: a huge share, roughly between one-third and two-thirds depending on how you count.

Tariffs, records and the rush to the vaults

•     2020 – Covid stops Ticino. Under lockdown the refineries shut, then reopened with special permits – PAMP and Valcambi below 50% of capacity – squeezing the world’s supply of bars (Bloomberg).

•     2024 – boom towards the US. Swiss gold exports to the United States rose to 11 billion francs, almost double the 6.1 billion of 2023 (AFP). AFP also reported total exports approaching 88 billion, with China the top buyer (25.1 billion) and India second (13.1).

•     August 2025 – the 39% tariff. Washington imposed a 39% tariff on Swiss goods and a customs ruling brought 1 kg and 100-ounce bars into scope. According to Kitco, exports to the US fell by more than 99% in August, to just 0.3 tonnes. The head of the industry association admitted that an exemption had been expected.

•     The countermoves. Investing in US refining was floated, but Valcambi COO Simone Knobloch warned that building new refineries there “lacks commercial logic”; MKS PAMP already has a minting facility in Oklahoma.

•     November 2025 – the thaw. The revised agreement lowered tariffs on most Swiss exports to 15% and excluded refined gold (swissinfo).

•     2026 – records and shifting flows. According to the Swiss Bankers Association’s analysis, gold hit an all-time high of $5,597.23 an ounce on 28 January 2026. In March, Swiss exports rose 30% on the previous month, with the UK at 57.6 tonnes (Kitco). Argor-Heraeus’s co-CEO notes, however, that a sharply rising price is not generally good news for their business.

The shadows: traceability and ethics

•     Swissaid (2020). The NGO criticised insufficient checks on the origin of gold refined in Ticino, especially gold imported via the United Arab Emirates: according to the report this mainly concerns Valcambi and, to a lesser extent, Argor-Heraeus, while PAMP was singled out as more virtuous. Valcambi replied that gold from the Emirates is traceable; more recently it left the industry association citing “irreconcilable differences”.

•     The Congo case. After a complaint by the NGO Trial, the Swiss Federal Prosecutor’s Office opened proceedings against Argor-Heraeus for money laundering linked to war crimes, concerning nearly three tonnes of gold refined in 2004-2005 and originating from Ituri (DRC). The company rejects the allegations.

•     The political debate. In Ticino the MPS party proposed writing into the Constitution a ban on doing business with countries that do not guarantee human, environmental and labour rights, in a debate prompted by the gold refineries (laRegione).

Did you know?

•     The name Valcambi combines two Italian words: “Valori” (values) and “Cambi” (exchanges).

•     Inside Valcambi, RSI reported, there is even a wooden crate full of “gold pellets”, the grains from which bars are cast.

•     In Balerna, liquid gold pours straight from the crucible into the moulds for the standard 400-ounce bar of the London market.

•     In 2024 three out of four Valcambi employees were cross-border commuters.

Worth a visit: the “AURUM” exhibition in Chiasso

•     What: “AURUM. Dal fuoco alla forma. L’esperienza dagli Archivi Valcambi” (“From fire to form: the experience from the Valcambi Archives”), an exhibition created by Centro Culturale Chiasso together with Valcambi, which is celebrating its 65th anniversary this year. Curators: Graziella Brolpito and Nicoletta Ossanna Cavadini.

•     Where: Spazio Officina, Chiasso – a former car-repair workshop.

•     When: from Thursday 29 October to Sunday 29 November 2026 (opening on Wednesday 28 October at 5.30 pm). For opening hours and tickets, check the Centro Culturale Chiasso website (centroculturalechiasso.ch).

•     What you will see: tools, drawings, moulds, engravings, photographs and films from the company’s archives, in seven “rooms of art” running from raw material to finished product. Highlights include a pantograph also shown in action and the final room, “Behold His Majesty the gold bar”. The catalogue is a comic book starring a gold bar (illustrations by Valeria Vitale).

•     Side events: guided tours, a lunch break at the museum on 17 November, a meeting with the illustrator and a family workshop where you can make your own “gold bar”.

Sources

•     swissinfo – Switzerland: the world’s gold hub – https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/business/switzerland--the-world-s-gold-hub/33706126

•     RSI – Viaggio tra i lingotti ticinesi, risparmiati dai dazi di Trump (25.09.2025) – https://www.rsi.ch/info/ticino-grigioni-e-insubria/Viaggio-tra-i-lingotti-ticinesi-risparmiati-dai-dazi-di-Trump--3146337.html

•     RSI – Oro in Ticino, i dubbi di Swissaid (2020) – https://www.rsi.ch/info/ticino-grigioni-e-insubria/Oro-in-Ticino-i-dubbi-di-Swissaid--1220088.html

•     Valcambi – Our history – https://valcambi.com/about-us/our-history/

•     AFP – Swiss gold refining sector hits US tariff mine (agosto 2025) – https://turn.liquiddesign.co.uk/business-economy/288890-swiss-gold-refining-sector-hits-tariff-mine

•     AFP – Swiss gold refining sector stung by US tariffs (10.08.2025) – https://kr.fashionnetwork.com/news/Swiss-gold-refining-sector-stung-by-us-tariffs,1755905.html

•     Kitco/Bullion Trading – Switzerland’s gold exports 2026 – https://bulliontradingllc.com/?p=50273

•     Mining.com – Swiss gold refineries reopen as virus lockdown eases (2020) – https://www.mining.com/web/swiss-gold-refineries-reopen-as-virus-lockdown-eases/

•     Bloomberg – Gold’s supply squeeze should ease as Swiss refineries reopen (2020) – https://www.bloombergquint.com/markets/gold-s-supply-squeeze-should-ease-as-swiss-refineries-reopen

•     swissinfo – Did Swiss refinery launder Congo conflict gold? – https://swissinfo.ch/eng/swiss-politics/did-swiss-refinery-launder-congo-conflict-gold/37261638

•     Nasdaq/INN – Tariff Talks: Swiss Propose Investment in US Gold Refining – https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/tariff-talks-swiss-propose-investment-us-gold-refining

•     US Gold Bureau – Switzerland is Key to Global Gold (2017) – https://invest.usgoldbureau.com/news/switzerland-key-global-gold

•     laRegione – Raffinerie d’oro e aziende, ma solo se etiche – https://www.laregione.ch/cantone/mendrisiotto/1694401/servizi

•     Tio.ch – Quando dal fuoco sgorga l’oro: a Chiasso l’arte del trasformare è in mostra (27.10.2026) – https://www.tio.ch/ticino/attualita/1959313/quando-dal-fuoco-sgorga-l-oro-a-chiasso-l-arte-del-trasformare-e-in-mostra

•     laRegione – Dal minerale grezzo alla medaglia: a Chiasso la mostra ‘Aurum’ apre gli archivi della Valcambi (27.10.2026) – https://www.laregione.ch/culture/arte/1959441/dal-minerale-grezzo-alla-medaglia-a-chiasso-la-mostra-aurum-apre-gli-archivi-della-valcambi

•     APMEX – storia di Argor-Heraeus e PAMP – https://www.apmex.com/category/19490/1-kilo-gold-bars