According to the latest figures released by the World Gold Council, official gold holdings in Lebanon stood at 286.8 tons as of August 2012. This amount places Lebanon in the 18th position amongst the 100 countries with the highest worldwide gold reserves and the second among the 14 surveyed countries within the MENA region. Lebanon’s gold holdings accounted for 25.0% of the region’s total and 0.9% of the world’s total.
On a global basis, Lebanon was outperformed by Venezuela, Saudi Arabia and the United Kingdom while it came before Spain, Austria and Turkey. Regionally, Lebanon’s gold reserves were surpassed by those of Saudi Arabia which totaled 322.9 tons. Lebanon’s holdings exceeded those of Algeria which had a total of 173.6 tons in gold reserves. It was followed by Libya with 116.6 tons, Kuwait with 79.0 tons, Egypt with 75.6 tons, Syria with 25.8 tons, Morocco with 22.0 tons, Jordan with 13.4 tons, Qatar with 12.4 tons, Tunisia with 6.7 tons, Iraq with 5.9 tons, Bahrain with 4.7 tons and Yemen with 1.6 tons.
In parallel, Lebanon’s gold holdings accounted for 30% of its foreign reserves which places it first out of the 14 countries within the MENA region and 17th out of 100 entities. Globally, it was outperformed by the European Central Bank (32.0%), Ecuador (34.4%) and Belgium (39.1%) while it surpassed Spain (27.6%), Belarus (25.9%) and Egypt (24.6%). Regionally, Lebanon was directly followed by Egypt (24.6%), Kuwait (12.3%) and Syria (7.4%).
Lebanon Weekly Monitor – Bank Audi
13 August
Lebanon holds 18th highest gold reserves worldwide
Lebanon Weekly Monitor
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