Gold reserves

A gold reserve is the gold held by a central bank or nation intended as a store of value and as a guarantee to redeem promises to pay depositors, note holders (e.g., paper money), or trading peers, or to secure a currency.

At the end of 2004, central banks and investment funds held 19% of all above-ground gold as bank reserve assets.

It has been estimated that all the gold mined by the end of 2011 totalled 171,300 tonnes.^[1] At a price of US$1500 per troy ounce, reached on 12 April 2013, one tonne of gold has a value of approximately US$48.2 million. The total value of all gold ever mined would exceed US$8.2 trillion at that valuation.^{[note 1]}

IMF gold holdings

As of June 2009, the International Monetary Fund held 3,217 tonnes (103.4 million troy ounces) of gold,^[2] which had been constant for several years. In the third quarter of 2009, the IMF announced that it will sell one eighth of its holdings, a maximum of 403.3 tonnes, based on a new income model agreed upon in April 2008, and subsequently announced the sale of 200 tonnes to India, 10 tonnes to Sri Lanka,^[3] a further 10 tonnes of gold were also sold to Bangladesh Bank in September 2010 and 2 tonnes to the Bank of Mauritius.^[4] These gold sales were conducted in stages at prevailing market prices.

The IMF maintains an internal book value of its gold that is far below market value. In 2000, this book value was XDR 35, or about US$47 per troy ounce.^[5] An attempt to revalue the gold reserve to today's value has met resistance for different reasons. For example, Canada is against the idea of revaluing the reserve, as it may be a prelude to selling the gold on the open market and therefore depressing gold prices.^[6]

Gold reserves and their relevance in war times (Example from WW II)

Preserving the gold reserves is of intrinsic value to nations and therefore highly relevant in contexts of crisis and war. A typical example is a secret memorandum by the Chief of the Imperial General Staff from October 1939, at the beginning of World War II. The British Military and the British Secret Service laid out “measures to be taken in the event of an invasion of Holland and Belgium by Germany” and presented them to the War Cabinet:

“It will be for the Treasury in collaboration with the Bank of England, and the Foreign Office, to examine the possible means of getting the bullion and negotiable securities into the same place of safety. The transport of many hundreds of tons of bullion presents a difficult problem and the loading would take a long time. The ideal would of course be to have the gold transferred to this country or to the United States of America. [...] The gold reserves of Belgium and Holland amount to about £ 70 million and £ 110 million respectively. [Foot]Note: H. M. Treasury has particularly requested that this information, which is highly confidential should in no circumstances be divulged. The total weight of this bullion amounts to about 1800 tons and its evacuation would be a matter of the utmost importance would present a considerable problem if it had to be undertaken in a hurry when transport facilities were disorganised. At present this gold is believed to be stored at Brussels and The Hague respectively, neither of which is very well placed for its rapid evacuation in an emergency.”^[7]

The Belgian government rushed to get the gold out of the country into a safe place: Dakar. After the Germans had occupied Belgium and France in 1940 they demanded the gold reserve back. Vichy French officials took care of the transport and in 1941 handed almost 5,000 boxes with 221 tons of gold^[8] over to officials of the German Reichsbank.

Officially reported gold holdings

The International Monetary Fund regularly maintains statistics of national assets as reported by various countries.^[9] These data are used by the World Gold Council to periodically rank and report the gold holdings of countries and official organizations.

The gold listed for each of the countries in the table may not be physically stored in the country listed, as central banks generally have not allowed independent audits of their reserves.

As at June 2013 (Top 40 based on World Gold Council data)^[10]

Rank	Country/Organization	Gold (tonnes)	Gold's share of national forex reserves (%)
-	G6 (EU)	8,972.6	76%
1	United States	8,133.5	70%
2	Germany	3,390.6	66%
3	International Monetary Fund	2,814.0	N.A.
4	Italy	2,451.8	65%
5	France	2,435.4	65%
6	China	1,054.1	1%
7	Switzerland	1,040.1	8%
8	Russia	1,015.4[11]
9	Japan	765.2	2%
10	Netherlands	612.5	52%
11	India	557.7	7%
12	European Central Bank	502.1	27%
13	Turkey	487.3[12]	16.2%
14	Taiwan	423.6	4%
15	Portugal	382.5	84.0%
16	Venezuela	365.8	66.0%
17	Saudi Arabia	322.9	2%
18	United Kingdom	310.3	12%
19	Lebanon	286.8	22%
20	Spain	281.6	23%
21	Austria	280.0	48%
22	Belgium	227.4	33%
23	Philippines	192.7	9%
24	Algeria	173.6	3%
25	Thailand	152.4	3%
26	Kazakhstan	130.9	19%
27	Singapore	127.4	2%
28	Sweden	125.7	7%
29	South Africa	125.1	10%
30	Mexico	124.9	3%
31	Libya	116.6	4%
32	Bank for International Settlements	115.0	N.A.
33	Greece	112.0	76%
34	South Korea	104.4	1%
35	Romania	103.7	9%
36	Poland	102.9	4%
37	Australia	79.9	6%
38	Kuwait	79.0	9%
39	Indonesia	75.9	3%
40	Egypt	75.6	21%
41	Federative Republic of Brazil	67.0	1.0%
42	Kingdom of Denmark	66.5	3.5%
43	Islamic Republic of Pakistan	64.4	27.4%
44	Argentine Republic	61.7	7.2%
45	Republic of Belarus	49.4	24.5%
46	Republic of Finland	49.1	21.3%
47	Plurinational State of Bolivia	42.3	13.6%
48	Republic of Bulgaria	40.0	9.3%
49	West African Economic and Monetary Union	36.5	12.0%
50	Malaysia	36.4	1.2%
51	Ukraine	36.4	6.7%
52	Republic of Peru	34.7	2.3%
53	Slovakia	31.8	64.7%
54	Nepal	30.1	22.9%
55	Republic of Iraq	29.8	2.0%
56	Republic of Ecuador	26.3	28.1%
57	Syrian Arab Republic	25.8	6.5%
58	Kingdom of Morocco	22.0	5.7%
59	Islamic Republic of Afghanistan	21.9	13.8%
60	Federal Republic of Nigeria	21.4	2.0%
61	Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka	16.6	11.2%
62	Republic of Serbia	16.6	4.8%
63	Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan	14.2	5.5%
64	Republic of Cyprus	13.9	65.8%
65	People's Republic of Bangladesh	13.5	4.2%
66	Kingdom of Cambodia	12.4	11.1%
67	State of Qatar	12.4	1.4%
68	Czech Republic	11.0	1.1%
69	Republic of Colombia	10.4	1.2%
70	Lao People's Democratic Republic	8.9	34.4%
71	Republic of Ghana	8.7	7.1%
72	Republic of Paraguay	8.7	6.2%
73	Republic of Latvia	7.7	4.6%
74	Republic of the Union of Myanmar	7.3	4.4%
75	Republic of El Salvador	7.3	10.6%
76	Republic of Guatemala	6.9	4.3%
77	Republic of Macedonia	6.8	11.1%
78	Tunisian Republic	6.7	4.4%
79	Republic of Tajikistan	6.4	51.1%
80	Republic of Azerbaijan	6.0	2.0%
81	Ireland	6.0	16.6%
82	Republic of Lithuania	5.8	3.5%
83	Mongolia	5.8	7.4%
84	Kingdom of Bahrain	4.7	3.7%
85	Nation of Brunei, the Abode of Peace	4.0	4.9%
86	Republic of Mauritius	3.9	5.2%
87	Republic of Mozambique	3.7	6.6%
88	Kyrgyz Republic	3.3	7.1%
89	Canada	3.2	0.2%
90	Republic of Slovenia	3.2	18.5%
91	Aruba	3.1	18.5%
92	Hungary	3.1	0.3%
93	Bosnia and Herzegovina	3.0	3.1%
94	Grand Duchy of Luxembourg	2.2	10.7%
95	Hong Kong Special Administrative Region	2.1	0.0%
96	Republic of Iceland	2.0	2.2%
97	Independent State of Papua New Guinea	2.0	2.3%
98	Republic of Trinidad and Tobago	1.9	0.9%
99	Republic of Albania	1.6	2.8%
100	Republic of Yemen	1.6	1.2%
	Sum	31,868.8

Privately held gold

As of October 2009, gold exchange-traded funds held 1,750 tonnes of gold for private and institutional investors.^[13]

World gold holdings

See also

• Federal Reserve Bank of New York
• Gold as an investment
• List of countries by gold production
• Moscow gold, the reserves of the Bank of Spain sent to the Soviet Union during the Spanish Civil War.
• Peak Gold
• Silver as an investment
• Sovereign wealth fund
• Strategic Petroleum Reserve
• United States Bullion Depository
• Vaulted gold

Notes

References