DUBAI,  (Reuters Life!) – It’s the ultimate  hole-in-the-wall — a money machine that dispenses pure gold. But installed beneath the gold-coated ceilings of Abu  Dhabi’s Emirates Palace hotel, where royalty and billionaires  come for cappuccinos topped with gold flakes, the machine almost  seems part of the furniture. “The reason we chose Emirates Palace is because it really  fits with the surroundings here,” said German entrepreneur  Thomas Geissler, creator of the “Gold to Go” brand and chief  executive of Ex Oriente Lux.

The exterior of the machine is coated with a thin layer of  gold and offers customers 320 items to choose from, ranging from  gold bars that can weigh up to 10 grams, to customised gold  coins.

“All the gold is imported from Germany, and soon we will  have a customized gold bar with a print of the Emirates Palace  logo, which will be a nice souvenir for guests to take home,”  said Geissler.

Through a computer system, the ATM gold machine updates the  gold price every 10 minutes to match international markets.

For now, it takes notes of the local dirham currency, but  the option of using credit cards will soon be introduced.

The cash-for-gold machines were first tested in Germany in  2009, but Geissler chose Abu Dhabi for the official launch of  his invention because of the region’s high demand for gold.

“On the first night we had a lot of demand,” he said. “One  customer even bought one item of every product we have.”

Geissler’s timing is spot-on, as investors flock to gold as  a safe haven from economic turbulence.