Gold sales cost Europe’s central banks $40bn

Article reports that Europe’s central banks are $40bn poorer than they might have been after they followed a British move taken on the 7 May 1999 to shrink the Bank of England’s gold reserves, analysis by the Financial Times has shown.

Many other Central Banks, such as those in Switzerland, France, Spain, the Netherlands and Portugal, decided later in 1999 to follow Britain and sell off their reserves. At that time, gold was worth around $280 an ounce, less than a third of its current level of more than $900.