Casa da Moeda to Launch Gold Traceability Platform

Leondaro Abdias, Director of Innovation and Market at the Brazilian mint, Casa da Moeda do Brasil (CMB), announced measures to combat illegal gold trade in Brazil during an event held in May titled ‘Ways of Gold: the Importance of Traceability to Prevent Illegality and Irregular Extraction’.

The event was organised by Correio Braziliense, the media house in Brazil, in support of CMB and attended by representatives of the government, the central bank, parliamentarians and researchers to find solutions against illegal gold mining in Brazil.

The CMB Secure Traceability Platform will begin to be implemented later this year. Through an application, the federal government will be able to monitor the transactions, the origin of gold, and other information. A valid Smart Tax Seal will be issued for each transaction, both domestically and abroad.

Initially developed to supervise transactions of other products, such as beverages and cigarettes, since 2021, CMB has sought to expand innovation for the gold trade. However, implementation of the new platform still depends on receiving a delegation via Provisional Measure (MP) or another legal instrument. According to Abdias, the expectation is that this will take three to four months.

The new seal used by the CMB will have physical and digital versions. The first will be printed on the bar or ingot inside the site where it is cast. The leading brand will be a QR Code, which will be generated with each transaction. In the digital code, the person responsible for the creation of the ingot, the date of creation and serial number, the country and state of origin, the weight of the product, and the mining titles and previous traceability in the chain will be detailed.

Only agents duly accredited or authorised to produce ingots or gold bars would have access to these codes. So they are intelligent codes that are securely printed directly on the product, these codes are only generated and stored within the Mint blockchain, and they are only made available as this actor exists; that is, he or she is a legalised actor, explained the Director.

In addition to the traceability platform and the tax seal, the initiative will have other pillars of support, which are the technical assistance promoted by the institution itself, in addition to the legal basis and government performance. ‘Understand[ing] that it is a role of the State to control and use the tools at our disposal to suffocate the illicit market,’ added Abdias.

The new system’s main advantages are the opportunity for registration and control of all those involved in the purchase and sale of gold and the verification of online documentation before the transaction. In addition, the technology will allow the monitoring of all transactions on the blockchain, and the availability of civil information and online reports, permitting crosses with other sources.

The event was held in person in Brasilia, and one can listen to the broadcast online on social networks and YouTube of the newspaper Correio Braziliense.