Gold reserves by country

Weiss

or, as it were, organization (including ETFs!!!).

Also the % that gold represents of that nation's foreign exchange reserves...

World official gold holding (September 2008)
Rank * Country/Organization * Gold (tonnes) * Gold's share of total forex reserves (%)

1 United States 8,133.50 76.50%
2 Germany 3,412.60 64.40%
3 International Monetary Fund 3,217.30 -
4 France 2,508.80 58.70%
5 Italy 2,451.80 61.90%
6 Switzerland 1,040.10 23.80%
- SPDR Gold Trust ETF 1,024
7 Japan 765.2 1.90%
8 Netherlands 621.4 57.80%
9 People's Republic of China People's Republic of China 600 0.90%
10 European Central Bank 533.6 20.10%
11 Russia 495.9 2.20%
12 Republic of China (Taiwan) 422.4 3.60%
13 Portugal 382.5 85.90%
14 India 357.7 3.00%
15 Venezuela 356.4 23.40%
16 United Kingdom 310.3 14.50%
17 Lebanon 286.8 28.40%
18 Spain 281.6 37.00%
19 Austria 280 41.90%
20 Belgium 227.6 42.20%
21 Algeria 173.6 3.40%
22 Libya 143.8 4.20%
23 Sweden 143.2 11.70%
24 Saudi Arabia 143 10.00%
25 Philippines 133.1 9.90%
26 Singapore 127.4 1.90%
27 Bank for International Settlements 125
28 South Africa 124.3 9.60%
29 Turkey 116 3.90%
30 Greece 104.6 87.60%
31 Romania 103.7 6.60%
32 Poland 102.9 3.30%
33 Thailand 84 2.20%
34 Australia 79.8 6.10%
35 Kuwait 79 13.40%
36 Egypt 75.6 5.80%
37 Indonesia 73.1 3.30%
38 Kazakhstan 73 9.40%
- iShares Gold Trust ETF 66.9
39 Denmark 66.5 5.10%
40 Pakistan 65.3 16.00%
41 Argentina 54.7 3.10%
42 Finland 49.1 15.70%
43 Bulgaria 39.6 5.10%
44 West African Economic and Monetary Union 36.5 9.00%
45 Malaysia 36.4 0.80%
46 Slovakia 35.1 4.80%
47 Peru 34.7 2.60%
48 Brazil 33.6 0.40%
- Central Fund of Canada (Mutual Fund AMEX:CEF) 30.2
49 Bolivia 28.3 10.30%
50 Ecuador 26.3 11.60%
51 Ukraine 26.2 2.00%
52 Syria 25.9 -
53 Morocco 22 2.20%
54 Nigeria 21.4 0.90%
55 Belarus 20.3 11.60%
- BullionVault 15.0[11] -
56 Jordan 14.8 5.20%
57 South Korea 14.3 0.10%
58 Cyprus 13.9 29.70%
59 Czech Republic 13.2 0.90%
60 Netherlands Antilles 13.1 31.40%
61 Cambodia 12.4 12.90%
62 Qatar 12.4 2.60%
63 Serbia 12.2 2.30%
64 Laos 8.1 23.10%
65 Latvia 7.7 3.30%
66 El Salvador 7.3 8.20%
67 Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa 7.1 -
68 Guatemala 6.9 3.90%
69 Colombia 6.9 0.80%
70 Macedonia 6.8 7.60%
71 Tunisia 6.8 2.10%
72 Lithuania 5.8 2.30%
73 Ireland 5.5 16.30%
74 Sri Lanka 5.3 3.80%
75 Mongolia 5.2 10.90%
76 Bahrain 4.7 -
77 Bangladesh 3.5 1.60%
78 Mexico 3.4 0.10%
79 Canada 3.4 0.20%
80 Slovenia 3.2 7.20%
81 Aruba 3.1 17.10%
82 Hungary 3.1 0.30%
83 Mozambique 3 4.60%
84 Kyrgyzstan 2.6 5.30%
85 Luxembourg 2.3 10.80%
86 Albania 2.2 2.60%
87 Hong Kong 2.1 0.00%
88 Iceland 2 1.90%
89 Tajikistan 2 -
90 Papua New Guinea 2 2.10%
91 Mauritius 1.9 2.40%
92 Trinidad and Tobago 1.9 0.60%
93 Yemen 1.6 0.50%
94 Suriname 1.4 7.00%
95 Cameroon 0.9 -
96 Honduras 0.7 0.70%
97 Paraguay 0.7 0.60%
98 Dominican Republic 0.6 0.70%
99 Gabon 0.4 -
100 Republic of the Congo 0.3 -
101 Chad 0.3 -
102 Central African Republic 0.3 -
103 Uruguay 0.3 0.10%
104 Estonia 0.2 0.10%
105 Chile 0.2 0.00%
106 Malta 0.2 0.80%
107 Costa Rica 0.1 0.00%


Germany has some strong beliefs in gold. China has some catching up to do. Any other thoughts?

Gold reserves by nation per Wikipedia

rgCoinGuy

I wonder if Costa Rica got its little amount from Anaconda?

Also, the US having 3/4 of its reserve in Gold (if these numbers are still true), does make the US look to be in a good position even if some new Gold Standard based, or basket based global currency were to be enacted.

roadrunner

The gold totals include leased and swapped gold as well since both the lessor and lessee both count the same tons of gold as under each one's ownership. The IMF recommends and fully supports this accounting method which adds additional layers from transparency. In reality, there is no way for the pubic to tell who actually owns the gold even if a physical audit were conducted.

roadrunner

mhammerman

"...there is no way for the pubic to tell who actually owns the gold even if a physical audit were conducted."

Isn't that what an audit is? Also, there was a news story last week that I can't seem to find about a suit suing to have an audit of Fort Knox reserves. That article should make the news again as the suit goes forward. Wouldn't that audit not only account for the physical stash but also the ownership of the stash? If the audit actually happens then the urban legend of the gold all being gone will be either substantiated or dismissed.

RedTiger

I would be curious to see estimates of gold by country owned by individuals. In some cultures, gold jewelry is common, in others not so much. Obvious, any estimates of private holdings would be best guesses, I'd still be curious to see what an educated guess would be.

Weiss

Just looking at the chart (inaccurate as it may be) really drives home some interesting points: Germany is heavy into gold--but really, so are all of the countries who saw major activity in WWII. America, France, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, even Russia (Oddly enough, the UK is missing from the top 15). Is that just because they are the most industrialized, or is it because they saw the darkest darkness?

I tend to think of the Swiss as pretty conservative and defensive. Being 6th on the list and having gold represent 1/4th of their reserves seems to back that up.

Check out gold as a percentage of Portugal's foreign exchange. Most countries seem to hover between 20 to 40%. Portugal is 85%.

It's amazing to me that an ETF holds the 7th largest gold reserves ahead of several countries, including Japan, India, and China.

Any other interesting observations?

TomB

Didn't the UK actually go through with some significant sales of gold bullion six or seven years ago when the price was dramatically lower?

Higashiyama

Yes, they timed the market bottom almost perfectly. (I believe they sold for less than $ 300 / ounce )

KentuckyJ

> Yes, they timed the market bottom almost perfectly



I had forgotten all that. Were there in country political repercussions? I seem to recall it was not a popular move when the public found out about it.

dbcoin

The political repercussions to England for selling their gold at the bottom, was the guy who made that decision, Gordon Brown, is now running the country.

ProofCollection

I had heard that if gold were suddenly used to back the USD, an ounce of gold would be worth something on the order of 100k.

roadrunner

The Brits sold off 60% of their gold (451 tons) from 1999-2002. So prior to this, they would have been in the top 8 of the world's gold holders. It's possible that Gordon Brown did that to help "manage" currency prices as part of the overall G7 plan...and help him achieve the next rung up on the political ladder. It has also been rumored that he did it as a favor to the US who needed to bailout the losing hedged position a bank. The Euro was also coming on the drawing board at that time. Gold was bottoming out at about that same time near $254/oz. and maybe they just wanted to ensure it stayed there. Parts of the stock market were also beginning to show signs of stress in early 1999. The FED fund rates were cut from 6.5% in 2000 to 2% by 2002. Cutting the rate by 1/3 helped to fuel gold's tripling over the next few years.

The last number I saw for the pog based on US foreign debt, the price per ounce would be around $14,000. This is just to pay off our current foreign debts, not future domestic entitlements. That same ratio used in the early 1970's would have predicted a pog of $900 in the 1970's (it reached $875). The fact that the FED funds rate has dropped from 5.25% in 2006 to 0.25% in 2009 would seem to predict fairly significant leverage for another gold move similar to 2001-2006 and 1977-1980. The Fed fund rate drops preceding those previous periods were 6.5% to 2% and 13% to 4.7%. The difference so far in those earlier moves was that rates were systematicaly increased shortly after they bottomed out.

Gordy's golden garage sale - Rob Kirby

roadrunner

57loaded

Support for Gold via IF sales

this would seem to support a "physical presence" going forward more than a paper one?

PerryHall

I would have thought that countries would keep their gold reserves private. Or are these numbers someones best guess?

Higashiyama

At least in the industrialized world, they are usually publicly disclosed, often as an asset on a country's central bank balance sheet.