The National Bank of Kazakhstan is planning to reduce the amount of gold in their reserves this year. This comes as part of their diversification strategy to store the precious metal in safe foreign vaults abroad, as well as in the form of deposits in the metal accounts of foreign counterparties. As such, the National Bank will be selling gold in foreign markets this year and beyond, with an end goal of reducing the gold share in reserves to below 60%. The National Bank’s 2021 annual report also mentioned the establishment of a regional cash centre in Astana.
This centre will be equipped with a gold vault and is expected to house a bulk of the country’s domestic gold. In the past year, the National Bank sold 2022 tons of gold in foreign markets, and their reserves decreased to 351.7 tons. Meanwhile, the gold reserves in January of this year amounted to $ 36.78 billion, with gold making up 59.2% of the total, valued at $ 21.78 billion. Going forward, the National Bank of Kazakhstan has made it clear that they will continue to reduce the gold share in their reserves.
As such, they are actively looking for suitable foreign counterparties with the highest credit ratings in which to store the gold. This is being done with the utmost care and attention, with the exact amounts and countries of storage not being publicly disclosed for security reasons. The National Bank’s goal is to reduce the gold share in reserves to below 60% by 2023, and their efforts to diversify the precious metal in their reserves are a testament to their commitment to achieving this.