#GOLD #russia The gold reserves in the Russian Federation have sharply decreased.
The Central Bank is forced to deplete gold reserves to cover the budget deficit, which by the end of March reached 4.6 trillion rubles.
Russia has recorded the largest reduction in gold reserves in a quarter of a century. Over the four months of this year, it decreased by almost 28 tons of gold, the Central Bank of the Russian Federation reported on Wednesday, April 20.
It is noted that Russia's gold reserves in April 2026 decreased for the fourth consecutive month. As of May 1, the Russian Central Bank held 73.9 million ounces of gold bars. Over the month, this volume decreased by 200 thousand ounces, and since the beginning of the year - by 900 thousand.
In terms of tons, the Central Bank's gold reserves lost 27.9 tons of gold in January-April. And this was a record decline since 2002, according to data from the World Gold Council: then in one month (May 2002) the volume of gold in the Central Bank decreased by a total of 41.5 tons.
In the next two decades or so, the Central Bank mainly purchased gold, often by hundreds of tons per year, and never reduced the gold reserve by more than 100 thousand ounces (3.1 tons) per month - mainly for minting coins.
The only exception was July 2005, when 7.7 tons of gold left the Central Bank's balance sheet. However, the sale in 2026 exceeded this record by 3.5 times.
The Moscow Times writes that since January 2026, the Central Bank began selling physical gold as part of operations with the National Welfare Fund, which in the case of gold in recent years have been virtual. The Ministry of Finance, which is emptying the National Welfare Fund to cover the budget deficit, sold gold not on the market, but to the Central Bank, de facto transferring bullion "from pocket to pocket" and leaving gold in the ownership of the state.
Two reasons forced the Central Bank to start real sales of gold, according to Freedom Finance .
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