A gold reserve is the gold held by a central bank or nation intended as a store of value and as a guarantee to redeem promises to pay depositors, note holders, or trading peers, or to secure a currency. At the end of 2004, central banks and investment funds held 19% of all above-ground gold as bank reserve assets. It has been estimated that all the gold mined by the end of 2011 totaled 171,300 tones. At a price of US$1500 per troy ounce, reached on 12 April 2013, one ton of gold metal labels are making the deal. The total value of all gold ever mined would exceed US$8.2 trillion at that valuation.

 

IMF announced that it will sell one eighth of its holdings, a maximum of 403.3 tones, based on a new income model agreed upon in April 2008, a further 10 tons of gold were also sold to Bangladesh Bank in September 2010 and 2 tones to the Bank of Mauritius. These gold sales were conducted in stages at prevailing market prices. The IMF maintains an internal book value of its gold metal labels that is far below market value. An attempt to revalue the gold reserve to today's value has met resistance for different reasons. For example, Canada is against the idea of revaluing the reserve, as it may be a prelude to selling the gold on the open market and therefore depressing gold prices.

 

It will be for the Treasury in collaboration with the Bank of England, and the Foreign Office, to examine the possible means of getting the bullion and negotiable securities into the same place of safety. The transport of many hundreds of tons of metal labels a difficult problem and the loading would take a long time. The total weight of this bullion amounts to about 1800 tons and its evacuation would be a matter of the utmost importance would present a considerable problem if it had to be undertaken in a hurry when transport facilities were disorganized. At present this gold is believed to be stored at Brussels and The Hague respectively, neither of which is very well placed for its rapid evacuation in an emergency.”