Ex Oriente Lux CEO Thomas Geissler holds a gold bar after unveiling the first gold-plated ATM (automated teller machine) in Europe, at a Madrid's luxury hotel September 23, 2010. The machine, which features cutting-edge technology, dispenses 1g, 5g a
Ex Oriente Lux CEO Thomas Geissler holds a gold bar after unveiling the first gold-plated ATM (automated teller machine) in Europe, at a Madrid's luxury hotel September 23, 2010. The machine, which features cutting-edge technology, dispenses 1g, 5g and 10g gold bars and also dispenses gold coins bearing designs such as Krugerrand, Maple Leaf and Kangaroo, which are sold in gift boxes at real-time prices, organizers said in the media release. Reuters/Sergio Perez

Asia now has a gold-dispensing automated teller machine, and it is located in Singapore. The two ATMs are in Marina Bay Sands and Resorts World Sentosa.

Launched by Asia Gold ATM, Singapore is the fourth country to have the facility, next to the UAE, the UK and the US. Items such as 1g to 10g pure gold bars, as well as customised gold coins, could be availed and bought from the machine.

Top Swiss fine-gold company PAMP, which offers 24-carat 999.9 purity (the finest of pure gold), crafted all the products being sold at the machines. It will be sold at different prices daily, based on the day's global prices.

On Wednesday, the day the machines were unveiled to the public, a one gram pendant sold for $100 while it was $660 for a 10 gramme. The items can be paid through credit card or cash. Customers, however, are being strongly advised that the machines don't give change.

The machines have multilingual support, including Chinese, German, Russian and Arabic to enable customers to better understand their transactions. The machine's other features include user-interface customisation and 3-D product display support.

Kong Kok Chee, the Malaysian chief executive of Asia Gold ATM, said they chose Singapore for its first Asian location because thousands of affluent tourists from across the world come and visit the country.

"We want to give tourists something that they can collect and keep. You tend to buy and lose souvenirs, but for gold products, you tend to keep them for a very, very long time, and pass the item down from generation to generation," the Business Times Singapore quoted Kong.

Singapore is set to celebrate its Golden Jubilee in 2015. In anticipation of this event, its tourism board and Swiss gold company PAMP collaborated to release seven various ingot designs as a souvenir for locals and tourists. The designs range from 1g to 20g as well as a Merlion. Also to be made available are lunar calendar ingots with zodiac designs.

All ingots will come packaged within a sealed CertiPAMP certificate card and presented in a matching envelope.