Another Chinese Gold Bar 30 Grams 9999 - First Time Seen

[LawrenceChard]

This is the first time I have seen of of these bars.

The 30 gram weight makes me think it is recent, partly because the gold pandas changed from troy ounces to grams a few years back.

 

Chinese dragon and lightning pearl.

Typically, I can't read it, apart from 30g and Au9999, although Google lens says:

Auspicious

Nafo (or Nafu)

or 

Fresh Dragon (or moon)

Nafo

or

Xielong

Nafo

or 

Malong Nafu

or

Style Nafu

plus a number of other permutations.

Can anyone offer a better translation?

 

 

Edited October 13, 2021 by LawrenceChard

[dicker]

The dragon side if rather attractive.  Pretty impressive detail.  I am less enamoured with the other side which is somewhat cartoon like, but this may be my cultural bias and lack of understanding of the typography.

I suspect that this is pretty low (perhaps very low) mintage.

Best 

Dicker

[LawrenceChard]

48 minutes ago, dicker said:

The dragon side if rather attractive.  Pretty impressive detail.  I am less enamoured with the other side which is somewhat cartoon like, but this may be my cultural bias and lack of understanding of the typography.

I suspect that this is pretty low (perhaps very low) mintage.

Best 

Dicker

I agree, the Kanji is rather stylised. I consulted our son Duncan, who can read some Kanji, but mainly if it is Japanese.

[dicker]

A useful (language) specialisation to have.  Do let us know if you find anything else about this.  It is definitely unusual.  

Edited October 13, 2021 by dicker
Typo

[Happypanda88]

2 hours ago, LawrenceChard said:

Can anyone offer a better translation?

The four chinese characters are 祥龍納福

Literal translation: 

祥     auspicious, propitious 

龍     dragon (represents strength)

納     to receive, to accept

福     blessing(s), prosperity 

In simple English, Live Long and Prosper 😅

[LawrenceChard]

6 minutes ago, Happypanda88 said:

The four chinese characters are 祥龍納福

Literal translation: 

祥     auspicious, propitious 

龍     dragon (represents strength)

納     to receive, to accept

福     blessing(s), prosperity 

In simple English, Live Long and Prosper 😅

Thank you for that! 🙂

[Darr3nG]

@LawrenceChard if you were to purchase one, and put it under you very many tests... just saying... very pretty lump!

[LawrenceChard]

2 hours ago, Darr3nG said:

@LawrenceChard if you were to purchase one, and put it under you very many tests... just saying... very pretty lump!

Good question.

We will have almost certainly used our Niton XRF machine on it before we bought it, although I have not seen the test results (we don't always retain them).

I have asked for them, and will get to see them soon. The Niton seems to be good at detecting suspected gold plating, so I don't think it would miss anything on this bar. We could do an S.G. test on it, but it's something I haven't done since age about 16, but  again I don't expect it to find anything untoward.

The Chinese do produce lots of gold bars, and I think the law in China about selling fakes as genuine in China is quite tough, making them for export is different.

I was hoping to discover its manufacturer, but no joy so far.

Yes, it's an attractive bar.

I presume you have seen what we did when we got an unexpected result on a Krugerrand a few years ago?

 

[Darr3nG]

13 minutes ago, LawrenceChard said:

Good question.

We will have almost certainly used our Niton XRF machine on it before we bought it, although I have not seen the test results (we don't always retain them).

I have asked for them, and will get to see them soon. The Niton seems to be good at detecting suspected gold plating, so I don't think it would miss anything on this bar. We could do an S.G. test on it, but it's something I haven't done since age about 16, but  again I don't expect it to find anything untoward.

The Chinese do produce lots of gold bars, and I think the law in China about selling fakes as genuine in China is quite tough, making them for export is different.

I was hoping to discover its manufacturer, but no joy so far.

Yes, it's an attractive bar.

I presume you have seen what we did when we got an unexpected result on a Krugerrand a few years ago?

 

@LawrenceChard what say you? Does your magical XRF machine turn away .999 Silver???

 

[Skyfiller]

31 minutes ago, LawrenceChard said:

I presume you have seen what we did when we got an unexpected result on a Krugerrand a few years ago?

Where would we see that?

[Arganto]

10 hours ago, Happypanda88 said:

The four chinese characters are 祥龍納福

Literal translation: 

祥     auspicious, propitious 

龍     dragon (represents strength)

納     to receive, to accept

福     blessing(s), prosperity 

In simple English, Live Long and Prosper 😅

Would this be originally made to be used as a wedding gift or similar? I seem to remember something similar coming up on the forum a little while back, but it may just be a stuck cog in my noggin...

*Ignore me, I'm talking nonsense...I was thinking of this which is entirely different:

https://www.thesilverforum.com/topic/43539-help-with-1987-gold-britannia/?tab=comments#comment-471956

Edited October 14, 2021 by Liam84
*

[Happypanda88]

2 hours ago, Liam84 said:

Would this be originally made to be used as a wedding gift or similar?

I believe the item (because of the wording) would be more suited as a retirement gift or a senior couple's wedding anniversary or even a gift for parents/elders on their birthday.

[LawrenceChard]

9 hours ago, Skyfiller said:

Where would we see that?

https://www.chards.co.uk/blog/krugerrand-gold-content/507

 

[Hunter87]

Very nice.