ISLAMABAD -Russia’s Vladimir Putin fast ditches US Dollar amid dedolarization drive.
Russia managed to retain its recently-won fifth place among the countrieswith the largest gold reserves, increasing its lead over China and gainingon third and fourth place holders Italy and France, fresh statistics fromRussia’s Central Bank show.
According to bank figures, gold reserves grew by 159 tonnes in 2019 to atotal of 2,270.56 tonnes (73 million ounces), Sputnik has reported.
China, which dropped out of the top five in 2018, purchased an estimated100 tonnes in 2019, closing out at 1,948 tonnes (62.64 million ounces)during the same period.
The total volume of Russia’s gold reserves is closing in on Italy (2,452tonnes) and France (2,436 tonnes), but remains far below the first andsecond place holders: the United States (which has declared reserves of8,133.5 tonnes) and Germany (3,370 tonnes).
The continued growth of Russia’s gold reserves brings it ever-closer to the20th century Soviet record of 2,800 tonnes, built up on the eve of theSecond World War.
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According to the World Gold Council, central banks purchasedlinksome547.5 tonnes of gold in the first three quarters of 2019, with totalpurchases spiking at 12 percent compared to the same period a year earlier.Russia accounted for a whopping 20 percent of these purchases. In 2018,central bank buying of the precious metal broke a 50-year record, hitting atotal of 651.5 tonnes.
Due to its vast riches of untapped gold reserves, Russia is able to producelinkvirtuallyall of the gold that ends up in its vaults domesticallylink,with the Central Bank buying up close to half of total bullion produced.
In recent years, Russia has used gold, yuan, euros and other currencies to cutdown on the dollar’s sharelinkinits $500 billion international reserves cushion, dropping greenbacks andTreasuries amid deteriorating relations with Washington and the signing ofdeals with major trade partners such as China and India using localcurrencies.
