Editor’s Note
This article details a recent large-scale Customs operation targeting jewelers and gold traders across multiple major cities, described as one of the sector’s most rigorous campaigns. The focus is on suspected hallmark falsification and fraud.
The Customs administration has launched, in recent weeks, a vast control operation targeting jewelers and gold traders in several major cities of the Kingdom. This campaign, described by sources close to the matter as
, primarily targets suspicions of falsification and fraud surrounding official hallmarks affixed to jewelry, reports the daily Assabah in its Friday, October 3 edition.
A central inspection commission has initiated in-depth audits in Casablanca-Settat, Marrakech-Safi, and Fès-Meknès. Investigators, supported by the administration’s monitoring and risk analysis units, are scrutinizing customs registers and merchants’ import and distribution documents. The operation was triggered after the reporting of data deemed concerning regarding certain transactions carried out by major market players, the report reads.
Preliminary results of the investigations indicate strong presumptions of falsification of official hallmarks, used to recycle gold and reintroduce it to the market. This highly lucrative practice is said to have allowed some actors to generate considerable margins entirely illegally.
To tighten the net, the administration is now relying on the SAAD digital database, which enables automated risk assessment by focusing on indicators of money laundering and irregularities in raw material supply, explains Assabah.
The economic metropolis is the focus of most controls. According to the same sources, it has become a veritable digital platform for gold resale via social networks, notably TikTok, where live sales at abnormally low prices are multiplying. This trend has reinforced authorities’ doubts about the existence of parallel circuits and the distribution of suspicious products.
The investigations are not limited to local transactions. They extend to cross-border flows via Moroccan airports, particularly from Europe and the Gulf. Gold bars and 22- and 24-carat jewelry are reportedly brought into the territory, then melted down in clandestine workshops before being resold with dubious invoices and documents.
Several jewelers have been ordered to provide detailed information on their imports and exports, amid suspicions of a black market fueled by smuggled or stolen gold. Concurrently, customs has stepped up checks on travelers. While the law generally exempts women from declaring up to 500 grams of gold, consistent with their social status, cases deemed suspicious are now subject to systematic searches.
Another detected malpractice: the falsification of hallmarks on antique pieces, known as “dèk lqdim” (old hallmark). These illegal practices have angered many artisan jewelers, who have filed official complaints. They are calling for the establishment of individualized hallmarks per workshop or company, in order to protect local production and put an end to the spiral of fraud and illicit trafficking.
This crackdown operation could mark a turning point in the regulation of the Moroccan gold sector, at the crossroads of artisanal tradition and colossal financial stakes.