Our central banks team, in partnership with Yougov, recently concluded the 2020 Central Bank Gold Reserves Survey.1 This year’s survey, which saw a jump in the number of responses, shows strong signs of an increase in gold’s relevance for central bank reserve management: 20% of respondents say that they plan to add gold to their reserves this year, up from 8% in the 2019 survey. The results also indicate shifts in investment attitudes towards gold as the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic continues to affect the global financial and economic outlook.
Several key findings from the survey are worth highlighting. We polled 51 central banks on the themes which are relevant for their investment decisions. The overwhelming majority – 88% – picked “negative interest rates” as relevant. This view will probably be reinforced in the post-COVID-19 era as continued monetary expansion will keep global rates low or negative for the foreseeable future, a situation that increases gold’s attractiveness (“opportunity cost”) relative to fixed income.