BEIJING, Oct. 11 (Xinhua) -- As global gold prices have soared since the start of the year, China's domestic gold market has followed suit, extending its upward trend and sparking a shopping spree during the country's "Golden Week" -- the combined National Day and Mid-Autumn Festival holiday, which ran from Oct. 1 to 8.

Latest value-added tax invoice data from the State Taxation Administration reveals that surging gold prices drove a year-on-year increase of approximately 41.1 percent in national jewelry sales revenue over the eight-day holiday.

Traditionally, gold stores during the long holidays are crowded with consumers buying gold as gifts for friends' and family members' weddings. The last holiday, however, was different. Stores teemed with consumers purchasing gold for investment purposes, alongside young buyers with more rational preferences -- ones that balance value retention with aesthetic appeal.

Against a backdrop of record-breaking global gold prices during the holiday, clerks were kept constantly busy at a gold shop in Shuibei Wanshan jewelry business center in south China's Shenzhen. "When gold prices rose sharply, we had to adjust our product prices twice a day," said Chen Jinyan, a saleswoman at the shop.

A female customer, who came to purchase gold jewelry, said that she once opposed her son's plan to buy a 20-gram gold bracelet due to high gold prices. Unexpectedly, her son made over 900 yuan (about 126.67 U.S. dollars) in profit just 20 days after buying it. "It seems gold's value could really be preserved, and I'm also planning to buy some gold jewelry," she said.

Li Qiyao, a dance teacher, bought a gold bean during the Golden Week and buys one one-gram gold bean monthly as a savings strategy. She said she now has over a dozen gold beans, gaining a strong sense of security from collecting them, and they are easy to cash out or melt into a bracelet later.

The variety of gold products on the market is dazzling, and as prices climb, gold phone stickers engraved with blessings like "May you be prosperous, dear princess" have emerged as a new consumer favorite. Many buyers adorn their phones with these stickers, drawn both to their fashion appeal and the emotional comfort they bring.

Even lighter gold items -- those weighing 0.01 grams or less -- have found success, with pendants, phone cases, and chains in this category selling well during the holiday. Chen noted that such gold products are popular at her store, with many customers buying dozens at a time to gift family members and friends.

The gold recycling market also gained traction at the center during the holiday. One customer, surnamed Liu, went to the center to buy gold beads for her necklace and learned about gold recycling. She said she wants to sell her decades-old gold earrings for trendy new ones if prices are good.

According to announcements from China's domestic gold jewelry brands on Saturday, the price of pure gold jewelry at multiple domestic stores has exceeded 1,180 yuan per gram. Industry analysts noted that the RMB-denominated spot gold price has risen by more than 48 percent so far this year, calling 2025 a "super year" for gold.

On the international front, gold prices had broken through the thresholds of 3,000 U.S. dollars and 4,000 U.S. dollars per ounce within about six months this year. The World Gold Council said in a recent report that the gold price is up 47 percent since the start of 2025 to Oct. 7, marking the highest return in a calendar year since 1979.

As gold prices keep rising, investment-grade gold bars are in high demand at the center, making the market distinctly investment-driven.

Investing in gold is not a guaranteed profit -- gold pricing depends more on the next investor's willingness to bid, said Hu Jie, a professor at the Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, cautioning about market volatility for gold.

"In the short term, the speed of gold price increases has exceeded expectations and there is a possibility of overheating, but the medium- to long-term trend of gold remains bullish," said Liu Richeng, manager of futures and spot trading at Shandong Energy Group.

Liu believes that as an anchor for the balanced game of major global assets, gold is still being priced in the market's future uncertainties, including geopolitics, international monetary policies, and the creditworthiness of the U.S. dollar. ■