Gold in a country’s reserves functions like insurance against extremes: it does not solve everyday economic problems and it cannot replace sound fiscal and monetary policy, but in times of crisis it can be an asset that is hard to dispute, because it is not anyone’s liability, it does not depend on the creditworthiness of an issuer, and it has a global market. In recent years Poland has been among the countries that have expanded gold’s role in official reserve assets particularly strongly, treating it as an important element of the state’s financial security architecture.
In Poland, gold is discussed as part of foreign exchange reserves, understood as a pool of external assets that the state, in practice the central bank, can mobilize relatively quickly if needed to support financial stability, maintain international payment liquidity, or strengthen the country’s credibility in markets. Institutionally, responsibility for managing reserves, including gold, lies with Narodowy Bank Polski. In its communication about reserve management, the NBP emphasizes that safety and liquidity come first, and only then comes the pursuit of returns over a longer horizon.
The most concrete measure of gold reserves is the physical quantity expressed in tonnes, and here Poland has made a dramatic leap in a short period. According to NBP educational materials, at the end of December 2024 the NBP held 448 tonnes of gold. In September 2025 the NBP reported holding more than 515 tonnes, which it described as about 22 percent of the total value of official reserve assets, while other NBP reporting indicated that by the end of the third quarter of 2025 gold exceeded 515 tonnes and accounted for roughly 24 percent of official reserve assets. The World Gold Council later reported that after purchases in November 2025 the NBP’s holdings rose to 543 tonnes, close to 28 percent of reserves based on end-November valuation. It is worth remembering that “gold in reserves” is always two numbers at once: the physical quantity and the market value. Sometimes gold’s share rises not only because of purchases but also because the price of gold increases. For context, the NBP reported that at the end of December 2025 Poland’s official reserve assets totalled 231.0 billion euros, roughly 271.1 billion US dollars.
Why do central banks hold gold at all? The NBP points to classic arguments that appear in most reserve strategies. Gold is not anyone’s obligation, so there is no issuer whose bankruptcy could erase the asset. It carries no credit risk and is less dependent on the policies of any single country than many other reserve instruments. It is often viewed as a safe haven in periods of geopolitical or market stress, and it can improve diversification because its behaviour is not always closely aligned with other parts of the reserve portfolio, including at times the US dollar. In the more recent “age of sanctions,” another motivation has become more prominent globally: some central banks treat gold as a way to reduce political risk within the international financial system.
Official gold is typically held as bullion bars meeting the London Good Delivery standard, commonly around 12.5 kilograms each with minimum purity of 99.5 percent, with full traceability and market acceptance. Location matters as well. The NBP notes that central banks diversify where gold is stored to reduce geopolitical risk and the risk of constraints on their ability to use the asset. In the same materials, the NBP reported that at the end of December 2024 about 75 percent of Poland’s gold was held abroad, split broadly between the Bank of England’s vaults in London and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, while about 25 percent was held in Poland. This touches a recurring public debate between the intuition that “gold should be at home” for reasons of sovereignty and reassurance, and the counterargument that “gold should be where it is most liquid and operationally useful.” In practice, many central banks adopt a mixed approach.
Poland’s historical experience also shapes how society imagines gold reserves. The NBP recalls that in September 1939 an evacuation of the Bank of Poland’s gold was organized, with around 80 tonnes beginning a long journey through multiple countries and destinations before ending up in places including New York, London, and Ottawa. This episode is used today both as an argument in favour of gold, because it shows how reserves can help preserve state financial capacity under existential threat, and as a cautionary lesson that in crises what matters is logistics, alliances, and legal frameworks as much as the metal itself.
In contemporary history, the theme of bringing gold back to Poland has been equally symbolic. The NBP reported that in 2019 it repatriated around 100 tonnes of gold from deposits in the Bank of England. Financially, repatriation does not change ownership, as the gold remains an NBP asset wherever it is stored, but politically and socially it is a powerful signal that reserves are tangible and present, not merely an entry in an account. In a region with a strong memory of wartime losses and the removal of state assets, such symbolism can matter for public trust.
Seen as a strategic choice, increasing gold reserves has both potential benefits and real costs. Benefits most often cited include greater diversification of reserves and reduced dependence on a single issuer or market, stronger credibility through a visible buffer of safety, and partial resilience to certain political and sanctions-related risks. Costs and risks include the lack of current income, since gold does not pay interest like bonds, which creates an opportunity cost relative to yield-bearing assets. Gold’s price can also be volatile in shorter periods, so its stabilizing role in crises does not mean it is always stable day to day. There are also storage, security, auditing, and transport costs, and there is the risk of politicization, because gold lends itself to emotionally charged debates that combine symbolism with very large numbers.
Globally, the broader backdrop is a renewed central-bank appetite for gold, with official sector purchases remaining elevated in recent years. Against that trend, Poland stands out as particularly active, with the November 2025 increase to 543 tonnes highlighting how quickly the country has moved into the upper tier of global gold holders compared with only a few years earlier. If gold reserves are treated as part of the state’s security infrastructure, a useful discussion is not simply “gold, yes or no,” but rather what share of gold is rational given Poland’s risk environment and economic structure, what balance between domestic and foreign storage best combines symbolic reassurance with operational liquidity, and how the reserve strategy should be communicated to reduce politicization while strengthening trust in institutions.
