something brewing with cot figures, page-4

http://en.wikipe
dia.org/wiki/London_bullion_market

The London bullion market is a wholesale market for the trading of gold and silver. Trading is conducted amongst members of the London Bullion Market Association (LBMA), loosely overseen by the Bank of England. Most of the members are major international banks or bullion dealers and refiners. Five members of the LBMA meet twice daily to "fix" the gold price in a process known as the London Gold Fixing. The London bullion market should not be confused with the separate London Metal Exchange (LME), where only base metals are traded.

Gold is traded primarily over-the-counter (OTC) with limited amounts trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) and Tokyo Commodity Exchange (TOCOM).......cont'd


......Size of the market

The bulk of global trading in gold and silver takes place on the over-the-counter (OTC) market. London is by far the largest global centre for OTC transactions followed by New York, Zurich and Tokyo. Exchange-traded trading has grown in recent years with Comex in New York and Tocom in Tokyo generating most of the activity. Gold is also traded as a security on the London, New York, Johannesburg and Australian Stock Exchanges.

Although the physical market for gold and silver is distributed globally, most wholesale OTC trades are cleared through London. The average daily volume of gold and silver cleared at the London Bullion Market Association (LBMA) in November 2008 was 18.3 million ounces (worth $13.9 billion) and 107.6 million ounces (worth $1.1 billion) respectively. This means that an amount equal to the annual gold mine production was cleared at the LBMA every 4.4 days, and to the annual silver production every 6.2 days.[1]