Russian Gold Floods Into Hong Kong to $10.5 Billion as Dutch Central Bank Moves Reserves to London and Prices Hit $4,644 an Ounce

As the U.S.-Iran war approaches seven months, gold prices have surged to their highest level in more than three months and the global bullion trade is splitting along the same geopolitical fault lines driving that conflict.

Hong Kong has become the world's top destination for Russian gold, importing 92.1 tonnes worth roughly $10.5 billion in 2025, a 42% jump from the year before, according to Crypto Briefing. That's HK$82 billion moving through a city that, unlike the U.S., UK, and EU, imposes no restrictions on Russian bullion imports.

The route wasn't always Hong Kong. When Washington first sanctioned Russian gold miners in 2023, the trade rerouted through Dubai, which had long served as a clearinghouse for unconventional gold flows. Tighter UAE regulations pushed the trade elsewhere, and by late 2023 Hong Kong had overtaken Dubai as the primary hub, Crypto Briefing reported. Mainland China's own direct purchases of Russian gold climbed 15-fold to $3.3 billion between 2023 and 2025.

Washington has already tried to choke that route once. The U.S. Treasury sanctioned several Hong Kong-based firms in 2024, including VPower Finance Security, for facilitating Russian gold transactions, exposing them to secondary sanctions and money-laundering liability under U.S. law. No new charges or additional Hong Kong sanctions designations have been announced since. Whether Washington moves further against the intermediaries handling this trade remains an open question.

Beijing Builds Its Own Plumbing

China isn't just absorbing Russian gold, it's building infrastructure to trade it outside Western financial systems entirely. In January 2026, the Hong Kong government and the Shanghai Gold Exchange signed a deal creating the Hong Kong Precious Metals Centralized Settlement Company, known as Gondzin Settlements, according to minexforum. Trial trading under the new system began this summer.

The plan includes a vault capable of holding 2,000 tonnes of physical gold, dwarfing the roughly 310 tonnes the United Kingdom held in its own reserves as of this spring, per minexforum. A linked "Delivery Connect" service now moves gold between Hong Kong and mainland China, and major Western banks including JPMorgan, HSBC, and UBS are participating in the system.

Beijing appears to be pursuing a de-dollarization strategy, building a gold-trading hub outside Washington's reach, especially with Gulf turmoil threatening the UAE's role as an alternative center. The same infrastructure also gives Russia a permanent workaround for Western financial enforcement. Both can be true. Notably, Hong Kong's own five-year development plan through 2030 doesn't mention the gold hub at all, according to minexforum, leaving its long-term political backing unclear.

The Dutch Hedge, Too

It isn't just Moscow and Beijing repositioning gold. The Dutch central bank, known as DNB, announced it moved 86 metric tons of gold from vaults in New York and Ottawa to London between March and August, according to the Associated Press, as carried by Breitbart. Before the move, New York held 31.3% of Dutch gold and Ottawa held 19.7%; both are now down to 18.5%.

DNB Governor Olaf Sleijpen said the shift improves "the tradability of our gold reserves" and called it "crisis preparedness" amid "global political unrest," adding the bank expects it will "never need to use" the reserves but wants resilience regardless. About 27 tons were physically flown across the Atlantic in each direction, and the rest was achieved by selling roughly 59 tons in New York and buying the equivalent in London, which DNB says meets the trading standards it considers most liquid in a crisis. The bank did not say the move was tied to the Iran war specifically, and no source connects the two directly.

Prices Are Already Moving

All of this is unfolding as gold itself gets more expensive. Spot prices hit roughly $4,644 an ounce on August 24, the highest since May 18, up more than 17% from a July 17 low of about $3,959, according to the Epoch Times. The spike followed a threat from Iran's Supreme National Security Council secretary, Mohsen Rezaee, to block the Strait of Hormuz if Tehran faces further economic isolation.

Peter Schiff of Euro Pacific Asset Management argued on X that the rally signals investors think the Federal Reserve is "bluffing" on inflation control. ING commodities strategist Ewa Manthey said the fiscal outlook and renewed investment demand are driving the rebound, though she cautioned the recovery is "unlikely to be straightforward" given persistent inflation risk. ING's own estimate puts fourth-quarter gold averaging $4,150 an ounce, a forecast, not a guarantee.

Central banks and sanctioned exporters are betting that physical gold outside traditional Western custody offers more insurance than yield. Hong Kong's Russian gold boom, China's settlement system, and the Dutch reserve shuffle all reflect that calculation. Whether that bet pays off depends largely on how the Iran war and Washington's sanctions enforcement play out over the coming months.