As the price of gold soared, Julie Li thought her investment in the precious metal was the smartest decision she had ever made. Across China, many like her have poured their savings into gold, lured by companies promising hefty returns far into the future.

随着金价飙升，朱莉·李（音）认为，对这种贵金属的投资是她做过的最明智的决定。在中国各地，无数像她这样的人把积蓄投入黄金，被那些许诺未来得到丰厚回报的公司所吸引。

About a year ago, Ms. Li invested about $35,000 in gold bars through Yongkun Gold, a company that runs an online platform and dozens of jewelry shops in eastern China. The investments performed so well that she used a credit card to put in $20,000 more.

大约一年前，李女士通过永坤黄金投资了约25万元人民币的金条。永坤黄金是一家在中国东部运营线上平台和数十家实体金店的企业。由于投资表现出色，她又刷信用卡追加了15万元。

Last month, Ms. Li and thousands of other Yongkun Gold investors were supposed to receive a payout from their accounts. Instead, the company halted all withdrawals and shuttered its shops. Its headquarters in the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou closed, and the company stopped responding to calls and messages.

然而就在上个月，当朱莉·李和数以千名投资者准备获取收益时，永坤突然冻结所有账户、关闭线下门店，位于杭州的总部也人去楼空，公司不再回应电话和信息。

“That’s all my savings,” said Ms. Li, 28, who works as a customer service agent in China’s southwestern Sichuan Province. “The salesperson kept telling me that gold prices will keep rising.”

现年28岁、在中国西南省份四川从事客服工作的李女士说：“那是我的全部积蓄。销售人员一直告诉我，金价会持续上涨。”

The enthusiasm of individual investors like Ms. Li has been a major factor in supercharging the price of gold, which has recently set a series of records. In the first three months of the year, Chinese investors bought roughly 124 metric tons of gold bars and coins, a 12 percent rise from the previous year and far more than investors in any other country, according to the World Gold Council.

像李女士这样的散户投资者的热情是推动金价最近屡创新高的主要因素之一。世界黄金协会的数据显示，今年前三个月，中国投资者购买了约124吨金条和金币，同比增长了12%，远超其他国家的投资者。

The plight of Ms. Li and many other gold investors whose money may be lost is a worry for Chinese officials, who are sensitive to any potential source of social unrest. The local police have started a criminal investigation into the company.

李女士和其他许多黄金投资者可能血本无归的困境令中国官员感到担忧，因为他们对任何可能造成社会不稳定的潜在源头都非常敏感。永坤黄金的一名客户告诉中国媒体，她家在该公司的投资高达1200万元。当地警方已对该公司展开刑事调查。

Financial crime victims are often closely surveilled in China because many have resorted to public protests.

警方在调查的同时也警告心怀不满的投资者，不要组织集体维权活动。在中国，金融犯罪受害者往往会遭到严密监控，因为许多人曾诉诸公开抗议。

Dozens of investors, from several parts of China, planned to gather and protest with banners in front of the Hangzhou city government on Wednesday. They were met by groups of police officers as soon as they arrived, and at least one person was briefly detained, according to some people who were there. The rest were escorted to another building that accepts public petitions.

本周三，来自全国多个省份的数十名投资者计划在杭州市政府门前拉横幅抗议。据一些在场人士称，他们刚抵达现场就被大批警力包围，至少一名情绪激动的投资者一度被拘留。其余人员被引导至信访办。

After they returned home, some investors received phone calls or visits from the police, who warned them against making further petitions.

他们回家后，一些投资者接到了警方的电话或登门拜访，警告他们不要再上访。

Gold is often considered a safe investment during times of economic or geopolitical turmoil, and China’s slowing economy and trade war with the United States could be driving some of the demand.

黄金通常被视为经济或地缘政治动荡时期的避险投资，而中国经济放缓以及与美国的贸易战可能是推动部分需求的原因。

The rapid rise in excitement for gold also reflects Chinese buyers’ faltering confidence in other investments. The property market has not recovered from a deep downturn, which led to the collapse of high-profile investment funds. Mainland stock markets have languished for years.

对黄金的热情快速升温也反映了中国的投资者对其他投资的信心不足。房地产市场尚未从严重低迷中复苏，这导致一些知名投资基金倒闭。中国大陆股市多年来一直萎靡不振。

That has made gold an appealing alternative. The Chinese are “high-conviction buyers” who have “changed the dynamics of the global gold bullion market,” said Ross Norman, the chief executive of Metals Daily, an information and research firm.

这使得黄金成为一个有吸引力的替代选择。信息研究公司Metals Daily的首席执行官罗斯·诺曼表示，中国投资者是“坚定的买入者”，他们“改变了全球金条市场的格局”。

Fueled by those convictions, Chinese investors have piled into gold funds, and an industry has flourished by hawking gold bars, coins and pebble-size beans.

 在这些信念的推动下，中国投资者涌入黄金基金，一个销售金条、金币和小金豆的行业蓬勃发展。

Yongkun Gold Jewelry was founded in 2014 by Wang Guohai, a financial analyst who also sold gold and offered online investment services. Mr. Wang founded several asset management firms in the 2010s and earned honorary titles from government-backed institutions.

永坤黄金由金融分析师汪国海于2014年创立，该公司同时销售黄金并提供在线投资服务。汪国海在在本世纪前十年创立了数家资产管理公司，并获得了有着政府背景的机构授予的荣誉称号。

Investors took comfort in the company’s relatively long track record, its retail presence and the signs that it had a stamp of government approval. One of its subsidiaries, Yongkun Asset Management, had teamed up with the state-owned Industrial and Commercial Bank of China to sell gold-backed investments. Last year, Yongkun was praised by police for stopping scammers buying gold bars as part of a money-laundering operation.

公司相对较长的运营历史、零售网点的规模以及看似获得政府认可的形象让投资者感到放心。其子公司永坤资产管理曾与国有的中国工商银行合作销售以黄金为支撑的投资产品。去年，永坤黄金还因阻止诈骗分子购买金条进行洗钱活动而受到警方表扬。

Mr. Wang, Yongkun’s founder, was not reachable, and calls to the company were not answered.

记者无法联系到永坤黄金的创始人汪国海，公司电话也无人接听。

Ms. Li, the investor from Sichuan Province, said she had started putting money into Yongkun, drawn to the steady rise in gold prices when China’s banks were offering meager interest rates for savings deposits.

来自四川的投资者李女士表示，她开始将钱投入永坤黄金是因为金价稳步上涨，同时中国的银行所提供的储蓄存款利率太低。

Yongkun offered what seemed like a no-risk opportunity. Investors could order gold bars online and, after several weeks, either take delivery of them or sell them back to the company. They would pocket a profit if the price had risen, and if the price had fallen, Yongkun guaranteed to buy back the gold at the original purchase price, according to Ms. Li.

永坤黄金推出了一个看似零风险的投资方案。投资者可在网上下单购买金条，数周后既可选择提取实物黄金，也可将金条回售给公司——若金价上涨可赚取差价，若金价下跌，永坤承诺按原价回购，李女士说。

Customers who bought more than $400,000 worth of gold were promised an annual return of 9 percent.

公司承诺300万元以上的投资年化收益率高达9%。

Investors were given certificates attesting that the gold was stored in vaults at a branch of the state-owned Bank of China. However, when reached by phone, a representative for the bank branch, who gave only the surname Wang, said neither Yongkun Gold nor its affiliated companies had deposited gold there.

投资者获得了证明黄金存放在国有中国银行某支行金库的凭证。然而，当记者通过电话联系该支行时，一位只透露姓王的工作人员表示，永坤黄金及其关联公司都没有在那里存放黄金。

中国散户投资者的热情，是推动金价最近屡创新高的主要因素之一。

Fu Yindi, a college student from China’s northern Shandong Province, said her father, a construction worker, had invested the family’s life savings of more than $200,000, after a salesperson came to their home and guaranteed that the gold was being stored in bank vaults.

来自中国北方省份山东的大学生付茵迪（音）说，她的父亲是一名建筑工人，在一位销售员上门并保证黄金存放在银行金库后，把全家的积蓄140万元全部投了进去。

She said 700 other local residents, many of them retirees, had also invested with Yongkun shortly after the company opened a shop in their town, in the country’s largest gold-producing region.

她说，在永坤黄金到这个位于全国最大黄金产区的小城开设了一家门店后，还有700名当地居民也进行了投资，其中许多是退休人员。

“They believed the gold could keep its long-term value,” Ms. Fu said. “But now they can’t recover the money they saved.”

“他们相信黄金能够保值，”付女士说。“但现在连本金都拿不回来了。”

A former Yongkun employee, who asked not to be identified, said workers at the company had also invested in gold via the company’s funds, lured in part by lucrative bonuses for doing so.

一位不愿透露姓名的公司前员工透露，他们也通过公司基金投资了黄金，部分原因是这样做能获得丰厚的奖金。

Ms. Li said she was among the investors who traveled to Hangzhou last month to meet with the police and provide evidence. Yongkun investors have also used social media to claim that the company lost their life savings. The hashtag “yongkungold” has drawn about 30 million views on Douyin, China’s version of TikTok.

李女士表示，上月她曾与其他投资者前往杭州向警方提交证据。永坤投资者还在社交媒体控诉公司卷走毕生积蓄，抖音平台上#永坤黄金#的话题标签浏览量已突破3000万次。

Several Yongkun investors who spoke out on social media said they had received calls from the police.

几位在社交媒体上发声的投资者表示，他们接到了警方的电话。