Gold automated teller machine installed at Mumbai shopping mall

Mumbai, Nov 29 (ANI): A gold automated teller machine recently installed is the latest product to cater to the country's insatiable jewellery appetite.

The vending machine for gold coins and diamond earrings provides a quick fix for customers in the world's biggest gold consumer market.

Adjacent to a typical cash ATM in one of the city's most popular shopping malls, giggling girls pose for photos next to Gitanjali Export Corp's glittering gold box where customers can pick up 30, 000 rupees coins in less than two minutes.

The ATMs were launched to reach out to a wider base of customers and offer a convenient way to purchase.

Today banks report about 30-40 percent of their cash transactions through ATM machines, so people have become familiar, comfortable with the concept.

Customers can view and select products from the touch-screen and can pay using cash or credit cards.

"There is an investment purchase to this machine. There is a gifting through this machine and self indulgence to this machine," said Sanjeev Agarwal, the Chief Executive Officer of Gitanjali's.

Demand for gold and jewellery in India is at an all-time high, despite record-high prices on the back of worries stemming from the Eurozone crisis, which has seen investors flock to bullion as a safe-haven.

The Mumbai machine sells products that range from a 10 gram gold coin for 31,000 rupees to a 20 gram silver coin for 1,400 rupees, as well as assorted diamond jewellery. The prices are updated every day in line with global market costs.

Agarwal, whose firm is a unit of India's largest jewellery retailer Gitanajli Gems Ltd, said that sales so far have been very encouraging, with 28 transactions taking place on the first day.

Gitanjali aims to roll out 75 of the automated machines over the next three years, targeting locations such as airports and shopping malls as well as religious locations, where Indians often like to take home a memento of their visit.

"We are open, we are businessmen, so any good opportunities coming our way is welcome. There have been a number of enquiries, interest where some of the members have approached us to launch a similar joint venture-ship and put up these machines in say Singapore Airport and some of the other airports and other such locations and we are exploring it," added Agarwal.