Rather than market pricing which fluctuates daily, the New York Fed uses the United States official book value of $42.2222 per troy ounce for gold holdings.40☄2′17″N 74☀0′52″W / 40.70472°N 74.01444°W / 40.70472 -74.01444 The market value of a gold bar depends on its weight, purity level, and the prevailing market price for gold. For instance, traces of silver and platinum give the gold a whitish shade, copper is most often found in reddish bars, and iron produces a greenish hue. Tinges of color can indicate the type of alloy, however modest, from which a particular bar is composed. Therefore, each bar contains a small amount of at least one other metal, such as copper, silver or platinum. This would render them difficult to store or move. If they were 100 percent pure, the bars would be too malleable to preserve their shape. Surprisingly, gold bars are not 100 percent pure gold. A stamped seal of a refiner often identifies where the gold was cast. For example, a set of numbers on the bar often identifies its melt-the molten gold from which a bar is made-while another set indicates its fineness or purity. Markings on the bar also reveal information about its production. Bars from the Denver Assay Office have rounded sides bars from the San Francisco Assay Office have rounded corners and bars from the New York Assay Office have square edges. For bars cast in the United States under the pre-1986 standard, a bar’s shape can also indicate where it was cast. Currently, however, bars cast in the United States conform to the long-standing international standard for most bars cast overseas, which are trapezoidal in shape. While gold bars are mostly uniform, there are subtle differences that can signify, among other unique characteristics, when and where a bar was cast.īefore 1986, bars cast in the United States generally were rectangular bricks. The New York Fed charges account holders a handling fee for gold transactions, including when gold enters or leaves the vault or ownership transfers (moves between compartments), but otherwise does not charge fees for gold storage. Compartments are numbered rather than named to maintain confidentiality of the account holders. Each compartment is secured by a padlock, two combination locks and an auditor’s seal. In rare cases, small deposits are placed on separately numbered spaces on shelves in a “library” compartment shared by several account holders. This step is vital because the New York Fed returns the exact bars deposited by the account holder upon withdrawal-gold deposits are not considered fungible.įollowing the verification process, the gold is moved to one of the vault’s 122 compartments, where each compartment contains gold held by a single account holder (meaning that gold is not commingled between account holders). This helps ensure proper safekeeping and maximum security for the gold.Īll bars brought into the vault for deposit are carefully weighed, and the refiner and fineness (purity) markings on the bars are inspected to ensure they agree with the depositor instructions and recorded in the New York Fed’s records. These three individuals must be present whenever gold is moved or a compartment is opened in the vault-even to change a light bulb. Once inside the vault the bars become the responsibility of a control group consisting of three representatives: two members of the New York Fed gold vault staff and one member from the New York Fed internal audit staff. Gold bars are transported by elevator from street level to the vault’s basement location. The vault is able to support this weight because it rests on the bedrock of Manhattan Island, 80 feet below street level and 50 feet below sea level. However, the vault today remains the world’s largest known depository of monetary gold.Īs of 2019, the vault housed approximately 497,000 gold bars, with a combined weight of about 6,190 tons. Since that time, gold deposit and withdrawal activity has slowed and the vault has experienced a gradual but steady decline in overall holdings. At its peak, the vault contained over 12,000 tons of monetary gold. Holdings in the gold vault continued to increase and peaked in 1973, shortly after the United States suspended convertibility of dollars into gold for foreign governments. Much of the gold in the vault arrived during and after World War II as many countries wanted to store their gold reserves in a safe location.
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