Gold mortgage loan is a way of borrowing with gold as collateral. This kind of loan has a long history. For many years, South Africa, a gold producer, often used gold as collateral to borrow money from financial institutions in western countries.

In 1970s, Italy and Portugal used gold as collateral to borrow money from other countries due to the balance of payments deficit and foreign exchange shortage. The providers of loans are large commercial banks in Britain, Switzerland, the Federal Republic of Germany and the United States. The borrower is usually the central bank of the borrowing country. The process is that the lender and the borrower negotiate, and the latter will transport the mortgaged gold to the former's vault and get a loan at the same time. The borrower must repay the principal and interest after the loan expires, and at the same time recover the mortgage. The mortgage price of gold is generally significantly lower than the market price. For example, the gold mortgage price of a six-month loan is generally 25% lower than the market price.