Australia Central Bank has No 'In-Hand' Physical Gold Reserves

19 Dec 2012

by Jacque Fresco

After a campaign throughout 2012 to seek clarity in regards to the location of Australia’s Gold Reserves the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) has confirmed today in an email to me that 99.9% of their Gold Reserves are held in the gold vault of the Bank of England.

Please read below for the text of the RBA’s email response to me dated 19/12/12:

Thank you for your email.

As at end-June 2011 the Reserve Bank of Australia held 80 tonnes of gold in London Good Delivery bars. The Reserve Bank holds 99.9 per cent of its gold reserves in the United Kingdom at the Bank of England. The remaining 0.1 per cent is held at the Reserve Bank’s Head Office in Sydney.

London is a major global gold trading market and the Bank of England provides a secure and cost-effective storage location for central banks and market participants. The Reserve Bank has processes in place to ensure that the gold reserves are maintained appropriately. It is not considered necessary from management, security or operational perspectives to relocate the gold bars to a facility in Australia.

The Reserve Bank has reviewed its approach to releasing details about its management of the physical reserves of gold and decided to release the above information.

Please note that we answered your previous questions as a routine public enquiry. The FOI Act concerns itself with the release of documents, rather than answering questions, so a request must seek documents to be valid.

Regards

Chris Collins | Manager | Media & Public Relations Office
RESERVE BANK OF AUSTRALIA | 65 Martin Place, Sydney NSW 2000
p: +61 2 9551 9830 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting GRATUIT +61 2 9551 9830 end_of_the_skype_highlighting | f: +61 2 9551 8033 | w: www.rba.gov.au

I would like to thank Bullion Baron for their assistance in this matter and the encouragement and support of management and several clients of ABC Bullion, Sydney.

If you wish to view some of the gold stored in the Bank of England gold vault and see probably one of Australia’s gold bars watch this recent video tour of the vault.

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