France Pulls All Gold Out of US Federal Reserve

France has officially pulled the last of its gold holdings out of the U.S. Federal Reserve, closing the book on a years-long effort to bring its treasure back home — and walking away with a massive payday in the process.

According to reports, France’s central bank completed the sale of 129 tonnes of older gold bars that had been sitting at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, then replaced them with newly certified bars in Europe that now sit in Paris alongside the rest of the country’s reserves. The move reportedly generated nearly 13 billion euros, or roughly $15 billion, thanks to soaring gold prices and the timing of the transaction.

While French officials insist the decision was purely technical and not political, the optics are hard to ignore. At a time when trust in global institutions is under growing pressure, France made sure its gold was no longer sitting in a U.S. vault and instead under its own watch in the heart of Paris.

The Banque de France said the overall size of the country’s gold reserve has not changed. France still holds around 2,437 tons. What changed was the type of gold being stored. The central bank wanted to replace a leftover portion of older, non-standard bars with modern bars that meet today’s international rules for weight, purity, and certification, making them easier to trade on the global market.

Rather than going through the costly process of refining and shipping the old bars across the Atlantic, France sold them off between July 2025 and January 2026 and bought replacement bars in Europe. Those new holdings are now stored in Paris, where officials say they are easier to manage and better suited for trading on European markets.

French central bank governor François Villeroy de Galhau reportedly said the move was not driven by politics, but by market practicality. Still, the timing has raised eyebrows. With gold prices climbing and economic uncertainty continuing to rattle markets, France not only got its reserves under national control, but also scored billions in profit while doing it.

The central bank said the operation generated 11 billion euros in exceptional foreign exchange income in 2025 alone, with total gains nearing 13 billion euros once early 2026 transactions were included.

France has been working on its gold reserve overhaul for years. Much of its gold was actually moved back from the U.S. and the Bank of England decades ago, between 1963 and 1966. Since 2005, officials have continued modernizing the stockpile, and this latest step appears to be one of the biggest yet.

The effort is not over yet. France still has another 134 tons of gold to upgrade to modern international standards, with that work expected to continue through 2028.

For many observers, the message is simple: when times get shaky, nations want their assets close, under their own control, and ready to move. France may call it a technical adjustment, but to plenty of critics of global dependency, it looks like something bigger — a powerful country making sure its wealth is exactly where it wants it.