That's a great question and the answer is - I don't know for sure, which is why I advocate for owning both (bitcoin and gold). It is possible that some governments are accumulating BTC behind the scenes, although I haven't seen any credible evidence. I like to read revealed preference - you prefer X over Y if, when offered both, you choose X. So far in my view, revealed preference points to gold. You are looking at this from the multipolar (competing governments) viewpoint, whereas in my opinion we live under something very close to a One World Government ( https://controlplanecapital.com/p/how-i-know-we-live-unde… ). With countries representing 98% of global GDP developing/implementing CBDCs, the level of coordination is striking. BTC's settlement doesn't require state-controlled rails, which in my opinion is not something the Controllers are likely to embrace. This would destroy their ability to weaponize monetary rails. As you noted gold reserves of the West are very opaque. Only a small portion of gold buying by Central Banks is reported, and usually mostly by Emerging Market Central Banks. G7 can’t be seen stampeding into gold. If you're running the incumbent fiat+bond system (US, Eurocore), it is suicidal optics to visibly join the gold rush. If the US or major euro Central Banks started aggressively buying gold, the obvious signal to foreign creditors and domestic savers is: - “We are preparing for currency debasement / reserve system change.” That would basically nuke the bond market. Also, the moment you say "we’re buying gold because it’s the ultimate money", you implicitly admit: - "Your pensions and savings are sitting in a debasing unit we control." That's a legitimacy grenade. The official script still needs: - "fiat is fine", - "the dollar/euro are stable reserve currencies", - "gold is just another reserve asset, barbarous relic, diversification". If you visibly act like a goldbug, you blow up that narrative. I have written more about why I think all roads lead to gold in this article ( https://controlplanecapital.com/p/all-roads-lead-to-gold ). If you look at the EU architecture, it is practically the Freegold model ( https://controlplanecapital.com/p/mario-draghi-revealed-t… ). Euro was deliberately designed so that: - Gold is not legally "backing" the currency (no fixed parity), - But is held on the Eurosystem balance sheet, - And crucially, marked to market regularly in euros. I can write more on this and this is something I've done a lot of research on, but many people in positions of power and many bankers have slipped over the years (have given away that for them gold is the final store-of-value). I could probably write a 100 more articles like the Mario Draghi one just analyzing how different individuals in positions of power give up the game. If you want to look at it from a darker point of view - if the Controllers are thinking in global balance-sheet terms, it's coherent: 1) You want the manufacturing/real-asset bloc (China + some EM) to survive the reset with: - enough private wealth in hard assets to keep working, - enough sovereign + household gold to have credibility in the Freegold world. 2) You want the rentier/consumption bloc (US/EU middle classes) to bear a bigger share of the claim destruction, because: - their wealth is easier to dematerialize, - their consumption can be cut without immediate loss of productive capacity. Hence the asymmetry: - West: encourage paper, discourage gold. - China: accept/encourage physical gold accumulation. Chinese state-linked media regularly push narratives like "gold is a safe long-term store of value" and encourage retail buying. The West, not so much. Ultimately, I don't have any insider information, so all I can do is read incentives based on the information that I have and guess.