Bank safe deposit boxes are "hard to come by", and gold investments are heating up "niche" banking services.

Currently, there are more than 200 people waiting in line to reserve small-sized safe deposit boxes at our branch. If customers need to reserve a large-sized safe deposit box, they may have to wait for several years," said a staff member from the Beijing branch of China Merchants Bank on January 18th. Recently, reporters visited and interviewed several state-owned and commercial bank branches in Beijing and found that the hot trend of gold investment among residents is continuously driving the market demand for bank safe deposit boxes, with many banks experiencing a "difficult to obtain" situation for safe deposit boxes. Faced with a significant increase in market demand, the turnover rate of existing safe deposit boxes is relatively slow, and it is difficult to significantly expand the supply in the short term. With multiple factors at play, it is expected that the imbalance between supply and demand for bank safe deposit boxes will persist.