The gold price is surging, the world is jittery, and Beijing is still quietly adding bullion to the national pile. It's not the sort of decision that produces a dramatic photo-op—no ribbon-cutting ceremony for a few extra bars tucked away in a vault—but it speaks volumes about the way China wants to be positioned when the next bout of global financial indigestion hits.
On Saturday, official data showed China's gold reserves rose again in January, extending the country's buying streak to a 15th consecutive month even as prices climbed. The State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) said gold reserves stood at 74.19 million ounces at the end of January, up 40,000 ounces from a month earlier. On paper, it's a small monthly move. Politically, it reads like a habit—and habits in reserve management are rarely accidental.
China's central bank resumed buying in November 2024, and the latest update follows a cumulative net increase of 860,000 ounces in 2025. This is the slow, deliberate sort of accumulation that looks boring until you step back and realise it's been going on for more than a year.
China Extends Gold Spree To 15th Month: A Quiet Signal From Beijing
Wang Qing, chief macroeconomic analyst at Orient Golden Credit Rating, described the continued, measured accumulation—despite record-high global prices—as a sign Beijing is trying to improve the composition of its official reserves. There's a faintly technocratic way to phrase that, as if it were merely a tidy portfolio rebalance. But what makes it striking is the timing: when gold gets expensive, many buyers flinch. Beijing, at least in public data, keeps going.
Wang said that by the end of 2025, gold made up about 9.7 per cent of China's official reserves, still below the global average of around 15 per cent. That gap matters because it hints at motive: not a short-term trade, not a showy bet on the price, but a longer attempt to inch closer to what central bankers elsewhere consider 'normal' diversification.
He also argued that short-term volatility in the gold price is unlikely to materially change the central bank's broader direction of boosting holdings. That, too, is a revealing choice of words. It suggests Beijing is less worried about whether it paid a little too much this month than about where it ends up over years—an approach that can look stubborn, or disciplined, depending on your politics.
Beijing Diversifies Official Reserves: Why Gold Still Has Pull
The World Gold Council has offered a similarly strategic reading: in a recent report, it said China may have tactically adjusted the pace of its purchases as prices surged, but that continued buying still points to a push for greater diversification as international reserves expand. In plain terms, the message is that Beijing isn't simply chasing a rally; it's building an alternative ballast—something that doesn't depend on another country's policy choices.
Gold's appeal, of course, is its stubborn indifference. It doesn't pay interest. It doesn't come with a friendly letter from a finance ministry. It just sits there, universally recognisable, and—crucially for states that worry about financial coercion—hard to sanction in the same way as a bank account.
That doesn't mean China is abandoning other reserve assets, and the data doesn't claim that. What it does show is a preference for optionality. In an era when geopolitical relationships can sour quickly, optionality is power—and Beijing is accumulating it in ounces.
There's also a domestic subtext that shouldn't be ignored: Chinese policymakers have spent years talking about 'optimising' reserves and reducing vulnerabilities. Gold is one of the few reserve assets that carries a kind of psychological legitimacy with the public as well as with markets. When trust is a scarce commodity, governments hoard symbols of trust.
For now, the numbers are modest on a monthly basis—40,000 ounces is not a market-shattering surge. Yet the streak is the story. Fifteen months is long enough to stop calling this opportunistic and start calling it policy.
Originally published on IBTimes UK
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