The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Wednesday rejected the news of gold sale and said that there has been no change in the physical gold reserve and it remains stable at 880.52 tonnes. RBI has issued this clarification after reports which claimed that the central bank has sold gold worth about $ 12 billion to protect foreign exchange reserves from the impact of the ongoing conflict in West Asia. The central bank said in a statement that the RBI emphatically states that these reports are not true. It advised the general public to rely only on the official information released by RBI from time to time in such matters. Meanwhile, PIB also released a fact-check report on these reports. According to RBI, the share of gold in India’s foreign exchange reserves has increased from 13.92 percent at the end of September 2025 to 16.70 percent by March 31, 2026 and to 16.85 percent by May 22, 2026.
Explanation regarding gold holdings
Clarification on gold holdingshttps://t.co/JrCUhWWEHo— ReserveBankOfIndia (@RBI) June 3, 2026
Which news was declared baseless?
This reaction from the RBI comes after a Bloomberg report, citing data from Bloomberg Economics, said that India’s central bank may have sold a part of its gold reserves to protect its foreign-currency assets from the side effects of the war in the Middle East. BE’s senior India economist Abhishek Gupta wrote that the Reserve Bank of India probably sold gold worth about $12 billion in the two weeks to May 22, while purchasing foreign currency assets worth $7.5 billion. This decline came despite the increase in import duty on this precious metal, which should have increased the value of the bank’s gold and dollar.
The report further said that this shows that RBI was selling gold. The report said the alleged sale highlights the concerns India is facing due to continued capital outflows and rising oil prices. Bloomberg report says that this also shows that RBI is giving priority to liquid forex. The main reason for which is the continuously increasing pressure on the rupee due to current account deficit. According to the report, by the end of March, the central bank had 880.52 metric tonnes of gold, of which 77 percent was kept within the country. Six months ago, it had kept 66 percent of its gold in India.
What does the RBI report say?
RBI said in its half-yearly Forex report in April that most of its foreign reserves are with the Bank of England and the Bank for International Settlements. According to the annual report of RBI, as of March 31, 2026, the Reserve Bank had a total of 880.52 metric tons of gold, while as of March 31, 2025, it was 879.58 metric tons. This shows that this year the quantity of gold has increased by 0.94 metric tons. These figures show that instead of reducing its gold reserves, RBI increased it further during FY 26. The report further states that out of the total 880.52 MT of gold held with the central bank, 312.32 MT of gold was held as assets of the ‘Issue Department’, while the remaining 568.20 MT of gold was held under the ‘Banking Department’.
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