The Netherlands' central bank has transferred 86 tonnes of gold from North America to London, reducing the share of its bullion held in New York from 31% to 19% as it seeks faster access to its reserves in the event of a crisis.

De Nederlandsche Bank (DNB) announced on Wednesday that it had sold about 59 tonnes of gold held in New York and purchased an equivalent amount of London Good Delivery-standard gold — the benchmark quality and bar format accepted in London's wholesale market, the world's largest centre for bullion trading. In addition, more than 27 tonnes were physically moved from the U.S. and Canada to the Netherlands, while a similar quantity of tradeable bullion was transferred from the Netherlands to London.

"With this relocation, we have improved the tradability of our gold reserves," DNB Governor Olaf Sleijpen said in a release. "We expect that we will never need to use them, but we do need to strengthen our resilience and preparedness."

John Plassard, an analyst at Geneva-based Cité Gestion Private Bank, described the Dutch decision as a "fairly one-off move" in remarks to AFP, but cautioned that similar shifts by other central banks on a wide scale could damage confidence in the U.S.

A question of location

The repositioning is notable because it changes where a major Western central bank wants its gold to be available in an emergency, rather than how much gold it owns. Storing gold abroad at hubs like the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the Bank of England has long been common practice among central banks, allowing them to settle international claims and trade bullion without physically shipping metal. DNB did not say it had lost confidence in either the U.S. or Canada, but the move comes amid growing debate in Europe over the location of national gold reserves.

In April, the Bank of France pulled its remaining gold stored in New York and replaced it with a similar amount in Paris. Germany's Bundesbank, meanwhile, has faced calls to repatriate some of the roughly one-third of its bullion stored in New York.

The Netherlands' total gold holdings remain unchanged at 612.4 tonnes. London now holds the largest share at 32%, up from 18%, while 31% remains at DNB's cash centre in Zeist. New York and Ottawa each hold 19%. The reserves were valued at €72.2 billion (US$83.6 billion) at the end of 2025.

Geopolitical unrest

DNB said "increasing geopolitical unrest" prompted it to strengthen its crisis preparedness and to spread risk more evenly across North America, Britain and the Netherlands. Gold held at the Bank of England meets international trading standards and can be deployed more quickly than bullion stored in New York or Ottawa, the central bank said.

Germany holds the world's second-largest gold reserves and keeps a large portion — an estimated one-third, around 1,200 tonnes — in the New York Federal Reserve's vaults in Manhattan. The Bundesbank stated this year that the location "is and remains an important storage site for our gold."

France, one of the world's leading gold holders, had been storing 129 tonnes, or about 5% of its total holdings, with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York — a practice dating to the late 1920s. The country first began repatriating that gold in the 1960s.

Bank of France Governor François Villeroy de Galhau said in a release that the decision to keep the new bars in Paris was "not politically motivated," noting that the higher-standard gold bars it bought were traded on a European market.

Continued central bank buying

The Dutch reshuffle comes as central banks continue to accumulate bullion amid geopolitical and economic uncertainty. Official-sector net purchases reached 289 tonnes in the second quarter, a record for that period, according to the World Gold Council. Reported buying added another 23 tonnes in July, led by China and Poland.

Gold was trading above $4,475 per oz. on Thursday as a weaker U.S. dollar and lower Treasury yields lifted the metal. Spot gold gained 2% during the session.

China's parallel push

At the same time, China is building infrastructure intended to draw more bullion trading and price discovery toward Asia. Hong Kong launched a central gold clearing system in July and is developing yuan-denominated futures and a physical-delivery link with the Shanghai Gold Exchange, as it seeks to expand vault capacity to more than 2,000 tonnes by 2030.

The Chinese initiative points in a different geographical direction from the Dutch decision, but both underscore an increasingly important question for reserve managers: not simply whether to own gold, but where the metal is held and how quickly it can be mobilized — a choice shaped by geography, politics, and market access rather than by the metal itself. Whether other European central banks follow the Dutch and French example is likely to shape the debate over reserve storage in the months ahead.