Russia Breaks Its Own Gold Record

By Louis Cammarosano

Russia added 700,000 (21.77 tonnes) of gold to its reserves in November.

Increase in Russian Gold Reserves of 186 tonnes in 2015 is a record, surpassing record set in 2010 of 176 tonnes.

Year to date the Russian Central Bank has added 6,000,000 ounces (186.62 tonnes) of gold to its reserves.

Russia has added more gold to its reserves since October 2014 (7,800,000 oz) than COMEX has in its vaults (registered and eligible) (7,780,000 oz.)

Russia’s massive additions to its gold reserves come at a time when they are seeing their biggest decline in wages and retail sales since 1999.

Russia’s top central banker Elvira Nabiullina said recently “Regarding gold and foreign currency reserves, we have the desired benchmark of $500 bln, and not in the three-year term, it could be 5-7 years and more. We believe it is necessary in terms of creating additional financial cushion for the state in the face of such external uncertainties.”

Russia has been rebalancing its foreign reserves to favor gold vs. U.S. Treasury Bonds. Russia’s gold buying binge had coincided with a steady sell off of her U.S. Treasuries.

The above originally appeared at Smaulgld.com