The Centre on Wednesday firmly rejected a Bloomberg Economics report claiming that the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had offloaded a sizeable portion of its gold reserves to shield foreign currency assets amid West Asia tensions, calling the assertion ‘fake’ and unsupported by official data. According to the government, the share of gold in India's foreign exchange reserves has in fact climbed steadily — touching 16.85 per cent as of 22 May 2026.

What the government said

The clarification was issued by the Fact Check Unit of the Press Information Bureau (PIB), which cited official RBI data to counter the interpretation that the central bank had liquidated bullion during a period of heightened geopolitical uncertainty linked to the Iran-US standoff.

‘According to RBI, the share of gold in India's foreign exchange reserves rose from 13.92 per cent at end-September 2025 to 16.70 per cent on 31 March 2026, and further to 16.85 per cent as of 22 May 2026,’ the PIB's Fact Check Unit stated.

What the Bloomberg analysis claimed

The disputed assessment, authored by Abhishek Gupta, Senior India Economist at Bloomberg Economics, estimated that the RBI may have sold gold worth nearly $12 billion during the two weeks ending 22 May 2026, while simultaneously purchasing roughly $7.5 billion in foreign-currency assets. The reasoning hinged on shifts in the composition of India's reserves during a window of West Asia volatility.

Why the data tells a different story

The Centre argued that the physical stock of gold held by the RBI has remained unchanged and is regularly disclosed in the central bank's Monthly Bulletin. ‘The physical stock of gold is also disclosed by RBI in its Monthly Bulletin. The latest edition is available on the RBI website. The status remains unchanged as on date,’ the PIB said.

Notably, a rising gold share in the reserve mix is typically inconsistent with large-scale sales — it usually reflects either fresh accumulation or a valuation effect from higher bullion prices, both of which complicate the sell-off thesis.

The broader context

This is not the first time the government's fact-checking arm has pushed back against external analyses of India's reserve management. The RBI has steadily expanded its gold holdings over recent years as part of a broader diversification away from dollar-denominated assets — a trend mirrored across several emerging-market central banks.

The episode also underscores how reserve-composition data can be read very differently depending on whether one looks at flow estimates or stock disclosures. Markets and analysts will now watch the next RBI Monthly Bulletin for a fuller picture.