Commodity Online
NEW DELHI: Even as the world is eagerly waiting for the move of central banks as far as gold sales are concerned, it seems that the banks want to hold on to their yellow metal reserves as the world witnessed a sale of 136 tonnes this year till now under the Central Bank Gold Agreement.

According to World Gold Council, the estimate covers central bank sales partly up to the end of April, and partly to June 7. Under the CBGA, the signatories are limited to selling a combined total of 500 tonnes a year, so 364 tonnes of the annual quota remain unfilled. Last year, the signatories only took up 358 tonnes of the quota.

As per WGC’s World Official Gold Holdings for June 2009, the US and Germany with 8,133.5 and 3,412.6 tonnes of reserves are the countries with the highest amount of gold reserves in the world. China the world’s largest gold producer to date has apparently slowed its gold accumulation spree. It holds 1,054 tonnes of its reserves in gold, which is just 1.8 per cent of its total reserves.

The reserves of the top three gold holders – the US, Germany and the IMF -- remained the same in the past three months both in terms of volumes and as percentage of their reserves in the past four months.

This is the last such list published by the WGC before the European central banks – who together hold most of the world’s gold reserves – meet for the Central Bank Gold Agreement meet in mid-September. The central banks will decide on the limit of offloading their gold reserves annually in this meeting. Analysts do not expect much gold to be released into the markets this year.

An intermittent rally in gold prices has increased the proportion of the bullion reserves (by value) of central banks across the world, even as, their volumes (by weight) remained the same.

The world is also waiting for the IMF move to sell 400 tonnes of gold which was permitted by the US and other G8 nations recently.