In recent years, gold has been moving from the West to the East as China, India and Russia have been buying as much gold as they can.
China actually advises its population to buy gold and a rising demand for the precious metal reached an all-time high in 2013 at 3,893 tonnes. Amazingly, 54% of this demand came from two places: India and China.
China has been cagey about letting the rest of the world know how much gold it holds. In June 2015, it said it owned 1,658 metric tons. However, many believe this figure is under-reported and that China has close to 3,000 metric tonnes.
China is also one of the largest gold-mining countries. None of the gold it mines ever leaves the country. It goes straight into the vaults.
It is only recently that the East has dominated global demand for gold. This infographic looks at why demand keeps expanding in the East. However, it doesn’t contain any information about Russia and its buying of gold (click the image for an enlarged view).
Why Gold Has Been Moving From West To East
