China Bought 40 Tonnes of Gold in June Through London, and Beijing Never Reported It

China's gold buying has run for 20 straight months, and the People's Bank of China just had its second-biggest month since early 2025 without telling anyone.

According to Crypto Briefing, China purchased more than 40 tonnes of gold in June through the London Over-The-Counter market. The People's Bank of China has not officially reported a purchase of that size. The gap between what the market shows and what Beijing discloses means China's actual gold stockpile is likely bigger than the official numbers say.

This isn't new behavior. China has a documented history of under-reporting its reserves, then updating the official tally months or years later. What's notable here is the scale: 40 tonnes in a single month, moved through London's OTC market rather than disclosed reserve channels.

It's Not Just the Central Bank

While the PBOC quietly stacks gold, Chinese households are doing the same thing out in the open.

According to data from the China Gold Association cited by BullionVault, private-sector gold demand in China hit 511.4 tonnes in the first half of 2026, worth a record 530.5 billion yuan, or roughly $77 billion. Retail bar and coin buying jumped 28.4% year-over-year to 339.3 tonnes.

Jewelry demand did the opposite. It collapsed 33.9% to 132.1 tonnes. Separate figures from Metals Focus, published by the World Gold Council, show Chinese jewelry demand in the April-to-June quarter fell to just 50 tonnes, the lowest quarterly figure on record going back to 2010, lower even than the Covid lockdown crash of 2020.

Chinese consumers are buying gold to hold, not gold to wear. Investment demand outweighed jewelry demand by 2.5 times in the first half of the year.

That shift lines up with price. BullionVault reports the average yuan gold price climbed from 420 yuan per gram in Q1 2023 to a record 1,088 yuan in Q1 2026, a 159% increase, before pulling back 9% to 990 yuan in Q2. Even with that pullback, the first half of 2026 still set a half-year price record above 1,037 yuan per gram. China's average household disposable income was 3,614 yuan per month in 2025, according to China's National Bureau of Statistics.

Chinese gold ETFs saw record monthly outflows in June, per World Gold Council data, but still pulled in a net 40 billion yuan ($5.6 billion) for the first half of the year, the second-strongest H1 on record. More recently, those ETFs logged 14 straight days of inflows through early August, the longest streak since March, pulling in more than $1.2 billion as investors reportedly moved into gold amid volatility in Chinese equities.

Why Governments Are Doing the Same Thing

This isn't a China-only story. According to Fox News, a World Gold Council survey found 89% of central banks worldwide expect global gold reserves to grow over the next year, and a record 45% plan to add to their own holdings.

Fox News quoted the World Gold Council's Cavatoni saying central banks are "diversifying" away from reliance on U.S. Treasuries, because gold "provides liquidity, diversification and protection against inflation and geopolitical uncertainty." The same survey found 90% of central banks cite gold's crisis performance as a reason to hold it, and 84% cite its role as a long-term inflation hedge.

Central banks from Poland to India have been adding gold for similar reasons over the past several years.

Fox News also flagged a darker angle: the NYPD has warned of gold scams targeting seniors, with victims in New York City alone losing more than $100 million, one victim losing $9 million, after scammers posed as government agencies to pressure elderly people into converting savings into untraceable gold bars. That's a separate problem from central bank reserve strategy, but it shows the same asset drawing very different kinds of attention.

What's Actually Unresolved

Nobody outside the People's Bank of China knows exactly how much gold China holds. The gap between London OTC purchase data and Beijing's official reserve reports has persisted for years, and June's 40-tonne purchase is the latest data point showing that gap hasn't closed.

The open question is whether the PBOC eventually reconciles its official reserve figures upward, as it has done in past cycles, or continues to let unofficial market data run ahead of its disclosures. Until China updates its official numbers, the true size of its gold stockpile remains an estimate built from London trading data, not a confirmed fact.