LONDON, Oct 23 (Reuters) - China's imports of gold ore and concentrate plummeted in September because of a proposed rule change that could result in a substantial rise in tax liabilities for buyers, four sources with knowledge of the matter said.
If implemented, the rule change could disrupt the annual shipment of billions of dollars of gold ore and concentrate to China, the world's top refined gold producer.
Gold ore and concentrate imports to China do not currently attract import or value added tax (VAT).
Now Chinese customs are planning to identify gold concentrate containing a combined iron and sulphur content of more than 58% as pyrite, which is subject to a 1% import tax and 13% VAT, the sources said.
Shipments of precious metals ore and concentrate excluding silver to China hit a six-month low in September, trade data showed. It dropped 22.4% to 201,004.9 metric tons from August, which was when Chinese customs revealed its plans, the sources said.
Gold ore and concentrate is the biggest chunk of this category, the sources said.
Chinese customs did not respond to requests for comment.
Higher taxes on gold concentrate and ore imports would squeeze trading margins, two of the sources said, adding that sellers of these products already faced a difficult market over the past couple of months due to the gold price rally.
Some traders have diverted their gold concentrate shipments to destinations other than China for fear of retrospective taxation, one of the sources said.
China's gold concentrate importers expressed their opposition at a meeting in late September but customs staff refused to withdraw the proposal, the two sources said.
Supplies of industrial metals such as copper could also be impacted in China. Peru, the world's third largest copper producer, exports a sizeable amount of copper-bearing gold concentrate, used as feedstock by some Chinese copper smelters.
If the changes to classification go ahead, Peru's copper-bearing gold concentrate may be diverted to other countries and exacerbate a mined copper shortage in China, the sources said.
Reporting by Julian Luk; additional reporting by Amy Lv; editing by Pratima Desai and Emelia Sithole-Matarise
