China made its largest monthly gold purchase in nearly three years and continues a massive accumulation streak, while other central banks have refocused on the precious metal.
This is among the reasons behind the asset’s price resurgence over the past week, in which it gained 8% from bottom to top.
China Buys Big
Data provided by The Kobeissi Letter shows that the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) added approximately 640,000 troy ounces, or roughly 20 tons, of gold in July alone, making it the biggest single-month purchase since October 2023.
Its streak has extended to a highly impressive 21 consecutive months of buying gold. The reserves climbed to just over 76 million ounces at the end of July from under 75.5 million in June. Current prices show that the country’s gold stash is worth over $306 billion.
Perhaps the bigger story here is the pace at which China is accelerating its purchases. It added only 160,000 ounces in March, followed by progressively larger acquisitions over the subsequent months. June’s 480,000-ounce accumulation was already the biggest in almost three years, only to be beaten by July’s acquisition.
Beijing has also focused on moving a large portion of its gold reserves from London to Hong Kong as it continues to support the city’s ambition to become a major precious metal hub.
“The relocation is set to continue as Hong Kong launches a new gold-clearing system aimed at making the city a bigger center for global gold trading and pricing,” said the analysts at The Kobeissi Letter.
Meanwhile, the World Gold Council data shows that central banks purchased a record 289 tonnes of gold during Q2, which is a 74% increase compared with the same period last year.
In contrast to its gold behavior, China actually tightened its cryptocurrency restrictions again earlier this year, confirming that any digital asset-related business activities remain illegal. It also expanded the scrutiny to stablecoins and real-world asset tokenization.
BTC vs Gold
The record accumulation from the PBOC and other central banks helped gold’s price stop its freefall and recover significantly over the past week. The precious metal fell from its ATH of $5,600/oz to just under $4,000 within months, but rebounded by 8% in the past week to close at $4,342. Interestingly, this recovery helped gold return to a breakeven YTD price.
As such, the bullion, even though it’s not really in the green in 2026, has performed a lot better than the so-called digital gold. BTC continues to struggle at $65,000, down over 25% since the start of the year.
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