AUSTRALIA'S GOLD RESERVE-Fake Gold Bars And Duplicate Serial Numbers In Gold Held @ Bank Of England

From the RESERVE BANK OF AUSTRALIA
Marked STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL
To the
Secretariat
Dated the 19th of July 2021
Senate Standing Committee on Economics
From the Reserve Bank of Australia
Quote
Serial numbers of gold bars held at the Bank of England
The attached table provides a list of refiners' serial numbers for the Reserve Bank's gold bars that are held at the Bank of England. The list is as at 21 April 2021. Note that a refiner's serial number is not recorded for every gold bar within the Bank of England's registry system at present. An upgrade of the Bank of England's registry system in 2015 created the capacity for the recording of this number and records have been progressively updated since then, although the work was put on hold last year because of the pandemic.
This information is strictly confidential and we request that it not be shared outside the Senate Standing Committee on Economics. We request that it remain in the Secretariat's possession and be able to be viewed by Committee members but not copied. Publication of these data would raise security risks for the Reserve Bank. The existence of fake gold bars has been detected, in the past, by the presence of duplicate refiners' serial numbers.