Bank Mellat, Saman and Saderat Enter Final Stages of Connection to the Gold Platform Supervisory System; Iran Starts Breaking the Online Gold Vault Monopoly (Saturday, 1 August 2026)

You may have bought gold in an app; but where is that gold actually kept? On Saturday, the first of August, three banks entered the final stages of that connection. Bank Mellat, Bank Saman and Bank Saderat are the three opening this route. The framework is the vaulting rules the central bank issued on the fifteenth of June. The chain has three links: the platform, the vault, and the supervisory system. The vault is where standard bullion is held, with assaying and insurance. The supervisory system ties a platform's selling capacity to real vault holdings. Today a gram of eighteen karat gold stood near eighteen million, eight hundred forty five thousand tomans. Why did the vault monopoly matter? Concentration risk, no competition, and a capacity ceiling. Banks already hold safe deposit vaults, insurance and audit, and are centrally supervised. But one caveat: vaulting stays with approved credit institutions only. For you, that means your backing can sit in several licensed vaults, with a public list. And what does not change: gold price risk and platform fees stay where they were. The verdict today is clear: transparency here is a process, not an announcement. So the answer: your gold sits in a licensed vault. Do you trust the app, or bullion in your own hands?