France pulls last gold held in US for $15B gain

https://www.mining.com/france-pulls-last-gold-held-in-us-for-15b-gain/

87•teleforce•1h ago

Comments

carefree-bob•1h ago

Good for France to relocate gold back to their own territory, but, uh, how can this result in a 15 B gain?

"The overall size of France’s gold reserves still remained unchanged at roughly 2,437 tonnes, which are now entirely held at the BdF’s underground vault in La Souterraine."

Is this some special form of French accounting, where the gold becomes more valuable when it returns to French soil?

kzrdude•1h ago

They sold the existing holdings and bought new of equivalent weight(?), so somehow they ended on profit on those moves.

tonfa•34m ago

The profit is just realizing the gains (resetting the cost basis for accounting purpose).

somenameforme•1h ago

Over about a year they sold their 'non-standard' (seems to be bars below the modern purity standards) US reserves, and replaced them with new reserves purchased elsewhere which are now stored in France. As the price of gold continued to rise as they did this, they ended up making a bunch of dinero while also centralizing their reserves.

eru•1h ago

I don't understand this. Did they increase the overall amount of gold they held?

KaiserPro•1h ago

Sold it at the peak, and then bought it locally a few months later.

rstarast•1h ago

First sell the gold, then buy same amount at a slightly lower price a bit later (on average)

xvedejas•1h ago

> the price of gold continued to rise as they did this

This would mean they sold low and bought high, right?

renewiltord•43m ago

It’s because they’re using European mathematics. You wouldn’t understand if you’re American.

In reality the article is attempting to account for a capital gain pnl accounting for taxes.

DaedalusII•42m ago

price of gold dropped from $5500 to $4600 in the last few weeks then came back. all is possible

mort96•13m ago

Then they didn't make money as a result of the price rising, which is what the original commenter and article claimed.

coldtea•30m ago

Usually that's how you want your selling and buying combos to be...

berkes•53m ago

But the gold price has been rising (on average) a lot over the period July 2025 to January 2026

tonfa•35m ago

From the annual report, it looks like the headline number (XXB gain) is just because it's realized capital gain (which due to their reporting requirement appears in their annual report, unlike unrealized gains).

They have ~same amount of gold between both years and it doesn't look like they took extra market risk.

wqaatwt•44m ago

Impossible to make anywhere close to that amount since they only sold 129 tonnes

berkes•58m ago

> As the price of gold continued to rise as they did this,

Seems counterintuitive to me. This would only make gains when they bought the new gold before selling the old, or when there's some arbitrage going on between Gold/USD, Gold/EUR and USD/EUR.

If they first sold the old for USD, then bought the new for USD, with a rising gold price, they'd miss the price-gain during the time between the trades, when they held the USD. It'd be a loss, not a gain.

If there's some arbitrage going on, then I highly doubt that brings $15B gain. The differences would have to be huge.

I think the (author (AI)) writing that article is simply mixing up stuff. I think this gain is not a cause-effect of the conversion, merely the gains from rising gold prices on the gold it holds over that period.

tux3•49m ago

The source is a press conference where they state the total amount and total value of gold stored hasn't changed. In le figaro they report the profit is due to variation in price between the different transactions. Which seems to be a polite way to say they took exceptional risk.

wqaatwt•46m ago

They repatriated 129 tonnes in total, its was absolutely impossible to make $15B from that since that’s what 129 tonnes are worth in total more or less.

tonfa•9m ago

> In le figaro they report the profit is due to variation in price between the different transactions. Which seems to be a polite way to say they took exceptional risk.

Nah it's just regular realized gain (delta between acquisition price and selling price).

https://www.banque-france.fr/fr/actualites/resultats-2025-de...

(so it's kinda irrelevant, it's just they have to put it in their books)

wqaatwt•48m ago

Well they has 129 tonnes in US which happens to be wroth around $15B or so. Probably the author has no clue what they are talking about and grossly misinterpreted..

stackbutterflow•1h ago

It's gold only if it comes from the Dore région of France. Otherwise it's just sparkling metal.

sph•1h ago

That accent somehow migrated two characters too far.

stavros•50m ago

Nah that's how it's spelled in French.

sph•42m ago

True, but ‘Doré’ means golden, and would make for a better joke.

pyrale•25m ago

On the other hand, Dore is an actual toponym.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monts_Dore

rkomorn•42m ago

The French part in that sentence should be the name of the region (eg Doré(e) ), not "région", and if you wanted to use the French spelling of "région", you'd have to say "région Dore".

Using the French spelling of région but the wrong word order doesn't make sense.

stavros•41m ago

Ahh I see, thanks.

jjgreen•15m ago

True connoisseurs prefer the metal from Lingots.

chii•1h ago

Gold in hand is worth $15B in the bush?

wodenokoto•59m ago

My guess is they buy before selling. An increasing market with a large buy might increase enough to allow for a profitable sell.

On top of this, this is physical gold, so location of the gold must play into it as well.

aucisson_masque•1h ago

Not done for political reasons.

oyebenny•1h ago

What makes you say that?

Ecco•1h ago

Reading the article is what made him say that.

berkes•1h ago

> BdF Governor Francois Villeroy de Galhau said the decision to keep the new bars in Paris is “not politically motivated,” as the higher-standard gold bars it bought were traded on a European market.

wqaatwt•1h ago

Well they are probably just being diplomatic, there is no point in accidentally triggering the ape.

avadodin•10m ago

"We do not do this as a political statement —we simply want our gold ingots to exist next week."

Still, a win does signal a dumb process behind the trade as the smart move would be to hedge with future options and/or futures.

But then again, maybe they did hedge the trade and it's just not the right time or place to report it.

tonfa•6m ago

To be fair, it's an ongoing process started in 2005 and which should finish in 2028. I doubt there was much political (tho the whole tariffs stuff probably made their job/decision easier when the gold price started diverging between NY and European markets). At this point it was cheaper than flying the gold to CH for recasting.

(1784 tons moved to standardized holding over the years, 134 tons are now left to convert -- all stored in Paris)

roenxi•1h ago

Are you suggesting they did this for technical or economic reasons? Like what? Is the US charging an unreasonable storage fee?

I'd read the article, but the site seems to be down.

wqaatwt•1h ago

Unless one reads between the lines.

NoLinkToMe•47m ago

And winning athletes and sports teams don't go to the white house due to 'scheduling conflicts'. And Amazon paid $75m for a Melania documentary because they saw real profit and need there. And Qatar bought Trump an airplane because it was important for his work. And everyone nominates him for a nobel prize because he ends wars and doesn't get into wars (we're just in a special military operation atm).

seydor•26m ago

Of course not . absolutely definitely nothing to do with the mad king (who is great and handsome)

fenykep•1h ago

Site doesn't load for me. https://archive.is/ePH8u

rstarast•1h ago

This seems to be the source article (Reuters, March 24): https://www.reuters.com/business/french-central-bank-books-1...

cladopa•54m ago

This is not gain at all. At least in theory: You own some tons of gold at the start of the process, you have the same tons of gold at the end of the process.

The only real gain is that you have gold in the US custody and the US can be tempted to just use it without telling you anything.

In other words, you had "paper gold" or "virtual gold" that the US can confiscate anytime, for example after invading Greenland, blackmailing France to do nothing.

You gain custody of what is yours.

0dayman•45m ago

which can be the difference between losing that entire amount or gaining it, and in this situation with this America, this is a big win if they manage to get it back in fact, if it hasn't been stolen or sold already

tgsovlerkhgsel•35m ago

From the full press release:

"In 2025 and at the start of 2026, while the volume of gold reserves remained unchanged, the Banque de France had to align a residual portion (5%) with technical guidelines, resulting in a significant realised currency gain. This exceptional foreign exchange income totalled EUR 11 billion for 2025."

-- the keyword here likely being "realized"

bamboozled•35m ago

It's more of a loss for the USA, which IMO is the unwritten point of the article.

France upgraded their gold bars to a new standard and as they were doing that, gold has appreciated massively in price, so France has the new shiny easier to trade bars, and the USA has the old harder to trade bars.

tux3•7m ago

They can be melted and brought to the modern standard, which is what they did with the rest of their holdings on the old continent. They sold these only because it was cheaper than transporting it.

coldtea•31m ago

As @somenameforme wrote:

[] they sold their 'non-standard' (seems to be bars below the modern purity standards) US reserves, and replaced them with new reserves purchased elsewhere which are now stored in France. As the price of gold continued to rise as they did this, they ended up making a bunch of dinero while also centralizing their reserves.

sounds like a gain to me.

mort96•6m ago

A gain of $15b? That's roughly the value of 100 metric tons of gold, remarkably close to the 129 tons that the article says was moved... did they double the value of their gold?

renewiltord•42m ago

I did this once. I bought Bitcoin on an exchange for $65k then I transferred it to my own wallet for a gain of $65k then I sold that for $65k for a total of $130k. Then I used the $130k on the exchange to buy Bitcoin again. Before I knew it, I was a trillionaire. Unfortunately the last time I tried to do it I bought my coins on FTX.

When you buy it make sure you use a French account though. If you use any other account then transferring the Bitcoin will just get you a Bitcoin not both the Bitcoin and the money. It’s European mathematics.

tonfa•29m ago

On that topic, video about the underground vault: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txyKenOq5Pw

wolvoleo•26m ago

We in Holland should do the same but our government (especially the right wing VVD) adores the US so they never bothered :(

codethief•22m ago

Is anyone here actually reading the article? Yes, they really made a gain of $15B:

> But instead of refining and transporting the gold, it opted to sell the bars and purchase new bullion in Europe. […] Due to rising gold prices, the move helped the bank to generate a capital gain of 13 billion euros ($15 billion),

mort96•11m ago

This doesn't make sense. If they first sold the bars held in the US, then the gold prices rose, then they bought gold in Europe, how the hell did that amount to a capital gain of $15b? How exactly do prices rising over the course of the process lead to these $15b?

adastra22•9m ago

Did they buy before selling? Otherwise that doesn’t make sense.

KingOfCoders•18m ago

Germany also needs to pull all gold. We have 1236t there.

zelphirkalt•4m ago

Would be good to not depend on the US that much any longer, since they have proven to be such an unreliable "partner". Even in a non-Trump future one cannot rely upon some future election not resulting in some similar disaster. Better to pull out, before some hothead gets weird ideas about that gold.

fasdfplasjk5425•16m ago

Looks like we're at the beginning of

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