Germany is the second largest holder of gold reserves with 3,381 tonnes (3727 U.S. tons), but it did not store most of the gold at home—at not least until recently.
In 2013, it announced it would ship back 300 tonnes from New York and 374 tonnes from Paris to make Frankfurt the main storage place. After moving 100 tonnes from New York and 110 from Paris in 2015, it has succeeded: Frankfurt now holds Germany’s largest stash of Gold (1402 tonnes), just ahead of New York (1347 tonnes) and London (434 tonnes).
Germany sent its gold overseas in the first place during the Cold War, afraid the Russians would raid the vault in Frankfurt in case of an attack.
Almost 25 years after the fall of the iron curtain, it makes sense to have more gold at home, especially given the uncertain financial climate. But there are a couple of odd things about the transfer.
1. Why Did It Take so Long?
Assuming there are 6,700 tonnes of gold stored in the vault as the Fed says on its website, why could they not ship the 300 tonnes Germany requested in 2013 in one fell swoop. It is Germany’s gold after all and Venezuela didn’t have any trouble shipping 160 tonnes back to London and some private vaults in only two short months in 2011.
Perhaps the gold isn’t actually in the Fed’s vault and had to be sourced from somewhere else? This would explain why Germany only transferred 5 tonnes in 2013 from New York. In 2014, it had reached 85 tonnes and now in 2015 100 tonnes.
