Let's Scrutinize The Bank of England's Claim That Meer Logistics Are Delaying Gold Bar Deliveries By 60 Days

"Gold is a physical asset. So there are real logistical constraints and security constraints. It takes time and the stuff is also quite heavy, as you know."

Bank of England deputy governor Dave Ramsden, February 2025.

---

The Bank of England (BoE) has recently claimed that the reason that gold bar delivery from BoE vaults has been pushed to 60 days from an historic 2 day delivery cycle is because of simple logistics.

Let’s look at simple numbers to understand this claim.

Philip Smith, Group Chief Executive of bullion trader StoneX stated in mid-February 2025 that 2,000 tons of gold (56 million (M) oz.) had been moved to US vaults in the prior 8 weeks.

The London Bullion Market Association (LBMA) expert panel discussing gold stated that 1/2 of the gold to enter the US recently came from London vaults.

Let’s conservatively assume that, over a 60 day period ending in mid-February 2025, ALL gold from London vaults and shipped to the US, ~ 28M oz., came from BoE vaults.

That would equate to 70,000 gold bars being shipped over 60 days or 1,167 bars per day.

Assuming a BoE work force of 12 people to select bars and move them to a loading dock, each employee would have had to have moved 97 bars per 24 hour day over our 60 day period to move the gold to trucks for delivery.

Again, this assumes all the gold shipped from London vaults during this period came from the BoE, which it did not.

Now, looking forward, the BoE says delivery of gold from its vaults is pushed to 60 days from the day of demand.

But then, if 28M oz. of gold have already been shipped from London since mid-December 2024, why the 60 day hold-up for further deliveries?

Swiss gold refiners state that they are currently unable to obtain adequate gold feed to meet demand, so the hold-up appears to be in shipping gold on trucks FOB London vaults to airports and onward to Switzerland for refining and reduction into deliverable products.

It appears that the vaunted London gold market has been tapped-out of gold bars available for immediate delivery from its vaults over the past two months.

The global market is left gasping for physical gold.

And the holders of 370M oz. of London gold spot/cash promissory note contracts have some questions.

Best regards,

David Jensen