By Abderrahmane Mebtoul, University Professor, international expert accountant at the Higher Institute of Management in Lille, France, Doctor of Economics
A country’s international reserves are generally the set of assets held by its central bank (currencies, gold, special drawing rights (SDRs)), so gold reserves are included according to the IMF’s international definition of foreign exchange reserves.
1. – Gold being indefinitely reusable and practically indestructible, the vast majority of tons of gold extracted since the beginning of humanity still exist. In total, mines produce about 60% of the global supply, with the remaining 40% coming from recycling and sales of central bank stocks. Gold served as the exclusive monetary standard with the Bretton Woods agreements establishing the international monetary system in 1945 (Gold Exchange Standard) with the dollar as the international currency defined in a certain weight of gold and other currencies in dollars. In 1971, with President Nixon, the United States suspended the convertibility of the dollar into gold and in 1976 the Jamaica agreements demonetized gold, which since then has no official monetary role. According to the World Gold Council (WGC) report, central banks’ global gold reserves are around 35,244.5 tons. Gold priced in ounces is traded on the precious metals market, mainly in New York, London, Zurich, and Hong Kong. The price of gold experiences significant fluctuations as a safe haven asset, depending on the inflation rate, global economic uncertainties, and global tensions. The price of gold in 2000 reached a low of $280 per ounce. During the 2020s, the price of gold, marked by a spectacular increase due to the COVID-19 pandemic and global economic uncertainty, reached a historic high of over $2,000 per ounce in August 2020, achieving record increases of +28% in euros and +36% in dollars compared to the beginning of the year. The September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States generated new international tensions, and successive crises each pushed the price of an ounce of gold above $2,000, and in the last quarter of 2024, we witnessed a historic record that pushed the price of the yellow metal to over $2,500 per ounce. Between the beginning and December 27, 2025, the price reached a record level between $4,300 – $4,500 per ounce (31.1g). For our calculations, we will use an average of $132,000 per kilogram using an approximate exchange rate of 1 USD to 0.92.
2. – Ranking of countries – gold reserves
USA 8133 tons, giving a value according to the average price at the end of December 2025 of $1073 billion
Germany 3350 tons, a value of $442 billion
Italy 2452 tons, a value of $323 billion
France 2437 tons, a value of $321 billion
Russia 2330 tons, a value of $307 billion
China 2304 tons, a value of $304 billion
Switzerland 1040 tons, a value of $185 billion
India 880 tons, a value of $116 billion
Japan 841 tons, a value of $111 billion
Turkey 641 tons, a value of $85 billion
Netherlands 612 tons, a value of $81 billion
Poland 515 tons, a value of $68 billion
Taiwan 424 tons, a value of $56 billion
Portugal 383 tons, a value of $51 billion
Uzbekistan 361 tons, a value of $48 billion
Kazakhstan 324 tons, a value of $43 billion
Saudi Arabia 323 tons, a value of $42 billion
United Kingdom 310 tons, a value of $41 billion
Lebanon 287 tons, a value of $38 billion
Spain 282 tons, a value of $37 billion
Belgium 227 tons, a value of $30 billion
Singapore 205 tons, a value of $27 billion
Azerbaijan 185 tons, a value of $24 billion
Algeria 174 tons, a value of $23 billion that has not changed in volume since 2005
Iraq 165 tons, a value of $21 billion
Libya 147 tons, a value of $19.40 billion
Brazil 145 tons, a value of $19.14 billion
Egypt 129 tons, a value of $17 billion
South Africa 125 tons, a value of $16 billion
South Korea 104 tons, a value of $13 billion
Kuwait 79 tons, $10 billion
Iran 61 tons, $8 billion
Oman 6.73 tons, $890 million
Bahrain 4.5 tons, $595 million
For the 10 countries with the most gold reserves in Africa, we have, in descending order:
10-Kenya 0.02 tons, a negligible amount
Total for Africa: 1010 tons
3.-What conclusion can be drawn?
There is no direct correlation between gold reserves included in foreign exchange reserves according to the IMF’s definition and the level of development. For example, Nordic countries like Sweden, Finland, and Norway, ranked first in the 2025 Human Development Index, have very low gold reserves. Lebanon, on the brink of bankruptcy, has a significant amount of gold, while some countries have invested in sovereign wealth funds, which are investment funds owned by a state that exploit a country’s excess economic reserves, typically from natural resource revenues or trade surpluses, to generate long-term profits. The Norwegian sovereign wealth fund, the world’s largest, reached a record value of around €1,750 billion in 2025, with only 28 tons of gold. The sovereign wealth funds of the Emirates (Abu Dhabi Investment Authority) and Qatar, with assets of $1.1 trillion and $557 billion respectively, have only 75 tons worth about $10 billion and 116 tons worth $15.31 billion. Another example is the marginal European Union, despite being the world’s third-largest economic area in terms of GDP after the USA and China, has only 36 tons, as well as some African countries experiencing remarkable growth but with little or no internal gold reserves. The wealth of a nation primarily comes from labor linked to good governance. After depleting its gold stocks, Spain declined for several centuries. The Romanian communist regime had foreign exchange reserves due to drastic import restrictions, but a ruined economy led to its downfall. This is what awaits oil-producing or raw material-producing countries that rely solely on this rent.
