Multi-millionaire Gattung's golden nest egg

Investing in gold has turned Theresa Gattung into a multi-millionaire. Photo / Greg Bowker

Investing in gold has turned Theresa Gattung into a multi-millionaire, the former Telecom chief executive told The Australian newspaper.

Gattung said a chance visit to the Perth mint four years ago was a turning point for the corporate high flyer.

"That is when I first thought about gold, and how it had been a great store of value through the ages. I just saw it being beaten into the slabs. I thought, gosh, this was something I had never thought about before, like many people,'' she told the paper.

It was July 2007 and Gattung had just made her final farewells from the telco after almost eight years in the job.

The debt-fuelled, pre-global-crisis sharemarket boom was in full flight, which rang alarm bells for Gattung.

By the end of the year, as the US sharemarket was struggling and Gattung sold her Telecom shares - worth $1 million - and bought gold bullion.

"Most of my friends and business colleagues thought it was a strange thing to do at the time,'' she said.

"I haven't traded. I have sold a little bit but basically sat on it. It has been able to help me sleep comfortably at night because it has been really steady.''

The gold price has risen 140 per cent, or more than 25 per cent a year, over the past four years amid the market volatility and uncertainty on world financial markets.

Overnight, spot gold was 1.6 per cent stronger at $US1888.90 an ounce. It rose to a record $US1894.10 earlier in the session..