Worried about their nest eggs in the global financial crisis, a growing number of investors are swapping cash for gold. Dealers of coins and gold bars are having trouble keeping up with demand.
Robert Hartman sounds a bit breathless as he answers his phone. “This is already a state of emergency,” the CEO of the Munich-based gold dealer Pro Aurum tells SPIEGEL ONLINE. For two weeks, he has been unable to fulfil all the gold orders his company has been receiving. Customers are storming its online shop. And the banks the company usually services just keep on ordering. At the company’s fulfilment center, orders are packaged seven days a week. “I’m just happy our employees have been willing to do this,” he says.
