The Bundesbank successfully continued its transfers of gold last year. In 2016, more than 216 tonnes of gold were transferred to Frankfurt am Main from storage locations abroad: 111 tonnes from New York and 105 tonnes from Paris. "The transfer of gold from New York was completed successfully last year," said Carl-Ludwig Thiele, Member of the Bundesbank’s Executive Board. "The transfers were carried out without any disruptions or irregularities. The gold storage plan for New York, which envisaged the transfer of 300 tonnes of gold from New York to Frankfurt, was fully realised in 2016," Mr Thiele stated.

According to its gold storage plan, unveiled in 2013, the Bundesbank will be storing half of Germany’s gold reserves in its own vaults in Frankfurt am Main by 2020. This required a phased transfer to Frankfurt am Main of 300 tonnes of gold from New York and 283 tonnes of gold from Paris by the end of 2016. "We will be able to complete the transfer of gold from Paris this year too," Mr Thiele added. Consequently, there will no longer be any German gold reserves in Paris. The realisation of the gold storage plan is therefore considerably ahead of the original schedule.

The following table gives an overview of the gold that has been transferred to date.

	from New York	from Paris	Total	Share
to be transferred by 2020	300 t	374 t	674 t	100 %
transferred in 2013	5 t	32 t	37 t	5 %
transferred in 2014	85 t	35 t	120 t	18 %
transferred in 2015	99 t	111 t	210 t	31 %
transferred in 2016	111 t	105 t	216 t	32 %
transferred to date	300 t	283 t	583 t	86 %
still to be transferred	0 t	91 t	91 t	14 %
Rounded figures.

As at 31 December 2016, the Bundesbank’s gold reserves were stored at the following locations.

	Reserves	Share
Deutsche Bundesbank, Frankfurt am Main	1,619 t	47.9 %
Federal Reserve Bank, New York	1,236 t	36.6 %
Bank of England, London	432 t	12.8 %
Banque de France, Paris	91 t	2.7 %
Total	3,378 t	100.0 %
Rounded figures.

The Bundesbank assures the identity of German gold reserves throughout the transfer process – from when the bars are removed from the storage locations abroad until they are stored in Frankfurt am Main. Once they arrive in Frankfurt am Main, all the transferred gold bars are thoroughly and exhaustively inspected and verified by the Bundesbank. When all the inspections of transfers had been concluded, no irregularities came to light with regard to the authenticity, fineness and weight of the bars.

On 23 February, the Bundesbank will publish an updated list of its gold bars on its website. This list contains the bar, melt or inventory numbers, the gross and fine weight as well as the fineness of the gold.