Three generations of refinery craft. Seventeen years of trading discipline. One uncompromising answer to the question every client asks: where did this come from?
KHALIL EBRAHIM began in 1962, when Henri Vasseur opened a small refinery on Rue du Rhône with three employees and a single Bunsen burner. For four decades the workshop served Swiss watchmakers and a private circle of jewellers.
In 2008, Henri's grandson Élise — armed with a degree in metallurgy from ETH Zürich and a decade at Metalor — pivoted the family practice into a trading house. The conviction was simple: refining without trading meant other people's stories were stamped onto our gold. Trading without refining meant we couldn't vouch for them. KHALIL EBRAHIM would do both.
Today, that founding logic still steers the company. Every bar we sell has been poured under our supervision. Every gram is documented, audited, and accounted for — from the moment it leaves the mine to the day it enters our clients' vaults.
If we cannot verify the chain of custody, we walk away from the trade. No exceptions, no quarterly targets.
Every gram of metal is logged from mine to vault. Our clients receive certificates that survive any audit.
Forty percent of our clients have been with us over a decade. We trade for the second sale, not the first.
Member of the OECD Due Diligence framework and the Responsible Jewellery Council. Conflict-affected gold refused without exception.
Two LBMA-accredited refineries, an SGS-supervised assay laboratory, and a research desk staffed by metallurgists from ETH and the Royal School of Mines.
Private banking-grade confidentiality. KYC handled by Lloyd's and BDO Geneva — never outsourced.
Henri Vasseur opens a 40m² refinery on Rue du Rhône, serving Swiss watchmakers with hand-poured gold cases.
Marc Vasseur opens a Zürich office, becomes the in-house refiner for three Swiss private banks.
Élise Vasseur incorporates Aurelia in DMCC. The trading desk opens with five employees and a single mining contract in Tanzania.
Aurelia is certified for the LBMA Good Delivery List for gold. The first Aurelia-stamped 1kg bars enter circulation that summer.
A direct-from-mine programme launches in Ghana, Côte d'Ivoire and Burkina Faso. Every gram traced from licensed pit to refinery.
Aurelia opens its third regional vault at Le Freeport Singapore, completing the Geneva–Dubai–Singapore custody triangle.
$2.4 billion traded annually. 380 institutional clients across 42 countries. Family-owned. Standard unchanged.
"We don't sell commodities. We sell the certainty that the bar in your hand is exactly what the assay says it is."
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