I did some research and tried to put pieces together.
1/ Central banks are buying, but top country is Poland (National Bank of Poland).
None of G7 is top buyers in 2025 till Nov.
German is a small buyer.
Source: IMF, respective central banks, World Gold Council
2/ The total buying from central banks surged in 2022
2022 vs 2021, more than doubled
2022 vs 2018, more than 50% surge
|
Year
|
Annual central bank net gold purchases, tonnes
|
|---|---|
| 2014 | 601.2 |
| 2015 | 579.6 |
| 2016 | 394.9 |
| 2017 | 378.6 |
| 2018 | 656.2 |
| 2019 | 605.4 |
| 2020 | 254.9 |
| 2021 | 450.1 |
| 2022 | 1080.0 |
| 2023 | 1050.8 |
| 2024 | 1089.4 |
Source: www.visualcapitalist.com
3/ Many gold buyers are Russia trading partners, except for Poland
Six of top seven central bank gold buyers in 2025 through Nov is a top Russia trading partner.
Poland (no)
Kazakhstan (yes)
Brazil (yes)
Azerbaijan (yes)
Turkey (yes)
China (yes)
Czech (yes)
Top Russia trading partners in 2024.
Source: oec.world
It looks possible that as Russia doesn’t want to accept or own USD, or it can’t use USD, its trading partners are buying gold as a form of payment.