World News
The Dutch central bank moves 86 tonnes of gold to London
By Staff Writer | 3 September 2026
De Nederlandsche Bank said on 2 September it had shifted about 86 tonnes from New York and Ottawa to London between March and August, taking the London share of Dutch reserves from 18.1 to 32.1 per cent. It gave increasing geopolitical unrest as the reason.
The Dutch central bank said on 2 September that it had moved part of its gold out of New York and Ottawa and into London, and that it did so to make the metal quicker to trade if it is ever needed. About 86 tonnes were transferred between March and August 2026, taken from a combined holding of about 313 tonnes in the United States and Canada.
The reason given is the bank's own. In view of increasing geopolitical unrest it is strengthening its crisis preparedness, and a more balanced spread between North America, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands both spreads risk and makes the reserves more readily available. No country is named on the release as the source of that unrest.
With this relocation, we have improved the tradability of our gold reserves. We expect that we will never need to use them, but we do need to strengthen our resilience and preparedness.
Olaf Sleijpen, Governor of De Nederlandsche Bank
Where the metal sits now
The bank published the distribution before and after. Zeist is unchanged at 30.8 per cent. London rises from 18.1 to 32.1 per cent. New York falls from 31.3 to 18.5 per cent and Ottawa from 19.7 to 18.5 per cent, which leaves the two North American locations holding the same share as one another. The Dutch reserves come to 612.4 tonnes, valued at 72.2 billion euros at the end of 2025.
The move was not one shipment. About 59 tonnes were sold in New York and gold meeting the international market standard was bought in London against the proceeds. More than 27 tonnes were then physically moved from the United States and Canada to the bank's cash centre at Zeist, and a similar quantity of standard bars went from Zeist to London. Doing it that way avoided melting bars down and recasting them to the London standard.
Why a central bank measures its gold in minutes
Gold held in London meets the international trade standard and is, on the bank's own account, the most readily tradable form of the asset and so the fastest to put to work in a crisis. The holdings in New York and Ottawa, it says, cannot be used as quickly or as directly. That is a statement about market plumbing rather than about any country, and nothing on the release suggests the reserves are expected to be needed.
A reserve that cannot be moved inside the time a crisis allows is not a reserve, it is an inventory. The relocation is an operational answer to that, and it was carried out over six months and announced only once it was finished.
The figures are the bank's own and were published after the transfers were complete. Whether any other holder reaches the same view about where its metal should sit is not something either record read for this account says anything about.