What are the countries that export the most gold in the world? Gold is one of the rarest and most precious metals in the world. Yellowish in color, gold is a dense, ductile and malleable metal. The metal is solid in normal conditions and is also one of the least reactive metals out there, which is why it can be found occurring naturally, generally in nuggets.
The history behind gold is amazing. It is believed to have been created from supernova nucleosynthesis while it has also been formed due to collisions between neutron stars. Furthermore, it is believed that gold was present in the dust from which the solar system was formed. When the Earth was created, the gold was in molten form and it sunk into the Earth’s core. Hence, the prevailing theory regarding gold present and found in the Earth’s crust is that it was delivered to Earth via asteroids crashing into our world, thought to have occurred nearly 4 billion years ago. If you want to know more about mining gold, you can visit 11 biggest gold mining companies in the world.
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Gold is not easily dissolved, as evidenced by the fact that it cannot be dissolved by any acid alone; instead, a mixture of acids is required to dissolve gold. However, gold can also be dissolved by alkaline solutions of cyanide.
Gold has been one of the most important metals ever since its discovery. It has been used in order to design jewelry, coins and other forms of art ever since its discovery, over thousands of years. For a large part of human history gold was used as a currency and became the standard on which nations and empires used to trade with each other. However, this slowly decreased especially in the 1930s when paper currency was beginning to emerge and in 1976, the gold standard was abandoned globally and the fiat currency system was adopted instead.
The reason gold has always been so expensive is due to the fact that it has been rare globally, it is easy to extract and smelt, it is resistant to corrosion and it looks flashy as well.
Nearly 50% of gold worldwide is used in jewelry. Furthermore, due to the fact that gold is ductile, malleable and resistant to corrosion, it is used widely in electrical connectors, colored glass production, tooth restoration and gold leafing. It is a good idea not to underestimate how malleable gold is. You can take an ounce of gold, and beat it into 300 square feet, which is simply astounding.
On the other hand, nearly 40% of the gold produced worldwide is used as an investment. Many of the people who own gold simply convert it into bullion coins and bars which are used as a hedge against any increase in inflation. As mentioned earlier, gold is also used in electric connectors, as industry use makes up 10% of all the use of gold in the world. This is due to the fact that gold is an excellent conductor and since it is resistant to corrosion, it remains fine for ages.
There are further uses of gold as well, such as being threaded into embroidery, while also being used as a coloring agent in the production of cranberry glass. Since, among many other properties, gold is also a good reflector of electromagnetic radiation, it is used in artificial satellites as well as astronaut’s helmets.
In order to determine the countries that export the most gold in the world, we consulted a report prepared by the Observatory of Economic Complexity, which has information regarding the $395 billion worth of gold exports. Here is our ranking, starting with number 10:
