India's finance minister Arun Jaitley announced on Saturday that India will introduce gold deposit accounts, will launch a sovereign gold bond, and will keep import duty at a record 10%.

Jaitley released the government budget, which included the measures on gold:

  • The gold deposit accounts and sovereign gold bond will impact to recycle the 20,000 tonnes available within India, held in households and temple trusts
  • "Though stocks of gold in India are estimated to be over 20,000 tonnes, mostly this gold is neither traded nor monetized," said Jaitley
  • Keeping the import duty at 10% is a signal of the government's continuing intent to cut imports of gold

The budget is for India's next fiscal year, which starts on April 1

Jaitley further unveiled:

  • A Goods and Services Tax (GST) would be implemented by April 1, 2016
  • Additional government spending in energy and housing
  • $11.3 billion increase in infrastructure spending
  • A cut in the corporate tax rate from 30% to 25%
  • A 2% tax on the "super rich"

Government forecasts are for Indian GDP to grow at up to 8.5% in 2016. Move over, China.