Growing fast and glowing bright

China's young gold-backed ETFs shrug off short-term shocks, evolve into long-term bets

When 63-year-old retiree Zhu Wanhua heard about the opening of the Shanghai Book Fair in August, she went to the annual event despite the late summer heat, in search of books on how to trade in gold-backed exchange-traded funds.

"There is a saying that when markets fluctuate, you should buy gold. I know there is a lot of talk about dama (retired ladies) buying gold. I used to buy gold too, but storage and transactions posed trouble. So, when I met my friend who trades in gold-backed ETFs, I decided to learn about them," she said.