The Bank of Namibia had acquired 8,573.52 ounces of gold, valued at approximately N$568.1 million, as at 3 August 2026, according to the Monetary Policy Dialogue presentation Governor Ebson Uanguta delivered on 12 August 2026. The presentation states that the gold has been sourced directly from a domestic producer since April 2026 and refined through an accredited refinery, and that the bank will keep executing its approved acquisition strategy through the rest of 2026. The bank signed a gold purchase agreement with QKR Namibia Navachab on 24 March 2026. The same presentation puts Namibia’s foreign reserves at N$56.4 billion at the end of June 2026.
The IMF’s Balance of Payments Manual (BPM6) counts only bullion of at least 995 fineness as monetary gold, so metal bought at a mine enters a reserve position only after refining. A buyer that sources gold directly from a producer and has it refined on its own account, the route the Bank of Namibia describes, keeps title through refining and is credited with the assayed fine content less the recovery deductions and treatment charges in its refining contract. Each lot is carried at provisional assay until the refinery has weighed, melted, sampled and assayed it, so an ounce count is a post-assay quantity and metal still in process at its reporting date is settled later. The refinery’s outturn statement is the document that turns kilograms dispatched from the mine into fine ounces in the owner’s metal account, and any buyer of the same production, the Bank of Namibia included, reconciles it against the producer’s dispatch weights. The presentation’s word “accredited” decides the bars’ next step. A bar cast by a refinery on the LBMA Good Delivery List is accepted into London vaults on the strength of the refiner’s mark and its line on the weight list. A bar from a refinery outside the List is assayed again at the receiving vault before it is taken in.
The presentation reports the Bank of Namibia’s own quantity, value and source as at 3 August 2026. The choice of refinery and of the vault holding the bars rests with the bank’s reserve management.