Questions & Answers About Our Gold Holdings

As part of Australia’s official reserve assets, the Reserve Bank holds an amount of gold. Including gold that is on loan, the RBA’s holdings amount to 80 tonnes, with the full value of these holdings recorded as an asset on the RBA’s balance sheet. The RBA’s position in gold has not changed since 1997. Data on the RBA’s assets and liabilities are presented in the RBA’s Annual Report and in ‘Statistical Table A1’ on the RBA’s website.

Separately, the RBA publishes data on Australia’s official reserve assets. To align the RBA’s reporting methodology with the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF’s) guidelines, since 2015 any gold that has been lent by the RBA is recorded as a forward inflow of foreign currency in the official reserves data and excluded from the RBA’s physical gold holdings. Similarly, any gold that the RBA has borrowed is excluded from the RBA’s physical gold holdings in the official reserves data. Reserves data are published on the RBA’s website in ‘Statistical Table A4’ and in the media release ‘Official Reserve Assets’ and show the value of the RBA’s physical holdings at the end of each calendar month. The statistical table ‘International Reserves and Foreign Currency Liquidity’ shows both the value and volume (in fine troy ounces) of the RBA’s holdings in line with the IMF methodology. Since 2015, any changes in the value of gold reported in the official reserves data reflect changes in the price of gold and/or changes in the amount of gold that the RBA has on loan.

Details on the reporting methodology for official reserve assets can be found in the RBA’s Bulletin article ‘Reporting Australia’s Foreign Reserve Holdings’.

Almost the entirety of the RBA’s physical gold holdings (99.9 per cent) is stored in the United Kingdom at the Bank of England (BoE). The BoE holds the RBA’s gold as bailee; legal and beneficial title to the gold remains with the RBA. A very small amount of gold is stored at the Reserve Bank’s head office in Sydney.

London is the world’s largest trading centre for gold. Storing gold at the BoE allows the RBA to readily access this market, as most gold market participants prefer to take delivery in London. The Bank of England provides a very secure and cost-effective storage location for central banks and other market participants. The Bank of England only accepts bars which comply with the London Bullion Market Association’s (LBMA’s) ‘Good Delivery’ standards.^[1] The RBA’s gold is held at the BoE in an ‘allocated’ account, such that individual bars (with specified bar serial numbers) are attributable to the RBA. (In an unallocated gold account, the customer does not own specific bars, but has an unsecured entitlement to a share of gold held in a ‘pool’.)

The Reserve Bank has processes in place to ensure that its specified gold bars are maintained appropriately. Inventory reconciliation is undertaken periodically and after any movements on the RBA’s account. Additionally, the Reserve Bank audits its gold processes, including gold holdings at the Bank of England.

Gains (or losses) on the RBA’s gold holdings mostly arise from changes in the spot value of gold. Gold holdings (including gold that is on loan) are revalued daily by the Reserve Bank at the Australian dollar equivalent of the LBMA’s 3pm fix, with revaluation gains and losses transferred to an asset revaluation reserve on the RBA’s balance sheet.

Gold holdings in a vault do not accrue interest. To earn some ongoing income, the Reserve Bank may lend its gold. For more than 30 years, the RBA has participated in the gold lending market, at times lending almost all of its gold holdings (Graph 1). Over the past decade, the RBA’s gold lending activity has been lower. A reduction in gold producers’ hedging demands, combined with greater willingness of other investors to lend their gold, has lowered the returns available from gold lending.

A summary of gold lending activity is recorded in the Reserve Bank’s Annual Report each year. In the early 2000s, the RBA earned approximately $15-20 million per year from gold lending. This declined sharply after 2006 due to both reduced lending activity and lower lending rates. In the 2022/23 financial year, earnings from gold lending activity amounted to $1.3 million, higher than the previous financial year but in line with earnings in 2020/21.

Any gold lending by the Reserve Bank is fully collateralised by cash (either foreign currency or Australian dollars) or has the benefit of a government guarantee of the borrower’s payment obligations to the RBA.

At the inception of each loan, the Reserve Bank and its counterparty will agree the maturity date of the transaction, the value of the gold to be exchanged and the interest rate payable. The RBA requires the redelivery of gold it has lent to be in the form of a physical delivery of gold to the RBA’s allocated account at the Bank of England (which may be effected by a book-entry transfer of serial numbered gold bars from an allocated account held at the Bank of England to the RBA’s allocated account held at the Bank of England).

The interest on a gold loan is paid in cash, not gold. Where gold is lent or borrowed in exchange for cash, the interest rate will be applied to the cash amount owing at the maturity of the loan.

The commercial relationships the Reserve Bank has with participants in the gold market are confidential; the same is true of the commercial relationships used in managing other official reserve assets. The Reserve Bank’s credit risk on its gold transactions is managed by only dealing with counterparties that meet strict eligibility criteria, such as minimum credit ratings from major rating agencies. Counterparties are also required to have entered into an International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA) Master Agreement with the RBA.

The Reserve Bank conducts its activities in the gold market in a manner consistent with the principles of the Global Precious Metals Code. (See the Reserve Bank’s Statement of Commitment.)

The Reserve Bank’s gold holdings at the Bank of England (BoE) were verified by an RBA Audit conducted in April 2022. The results of the Audit are published in the Gold Verification – Audit Report – June 2022. All gold bars selected were satisfactorily verified with no discrepancies or inconsistencies identified during the weighing checks. Based on Audit’s observations and discussions, the gold safe custody arrangements, segregation of duties and physical security arrangements at the BoE are appropriate.