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Russia Bought Another 200K Ounces Of Gold Right Before The Rally
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(Kitco News) - Russia continues to add gold to its reserves, buying another 200,000 ounces or 6 tonnes of gold in May, according to the country’s central bank.
This put the total of Russia’s total gold holdings at 2,190 tonnes as of June 1, up by 0.3% from May, Russian central bank said in the latest press release.
The latest purchase was made right before the latest gold rally shook the markets and the yellow metal surged to six-year highs and breaching the $1,400 an ounce level last week.
At the time of writing, August Comex gold futures were trading at $1,410.00, up 0.71% on the day.
Moscow has been actively buying up gold this year, adding more than 77 tonnes since the beginning of 2019, with around 40% of that bought in February.
In April, Russia purchased 550,000 ounces, preceded by 600,000 ounces in March, one million ounces in February, and 200,000 ounces in January.
During the last decade, Russia’s gold reserves have gone from 2% to 19% as of the end of 2018 Q4, according to the World Gold Council’s data.
Here's a look at top 10 countries with the largest #gold reserves by tonne ... See a drastic % change in #Russia and a massive drop in #Switzerland | @KitcoNewsNOW #kitconews #finance #preciousmetals #markets #economics #mining #investing | https://t.co/ufWmpoQ107 pic.twitter.com/1nMZ4QQFOC
— Kitco NEWS (@KitcoNewsNOW) April 22, 2019
Some analysts suggested that the reason behind this increased interest in the yellow metal has been a trend to diversify away from the U.S. dollar.
“I think what Russia is doing, or other central banks are recognizing, is that they need to increase their gold reserves because of the impending dollar crisis,” Euro Pacific Capital CEO Peter Schiff told RT last month.
