Vaults to Volts
The global race for strategic reserves is no longer confined to gold. While central banks continue to accumulate bullion at historically elevated levels, an equally important shift is unfolding beneath the surface; governments are increasingly treating critical industrial commodities as strategic assets in their own right.
The gold story remains significant. Central banks have purchased more than 1,000 tonnes of gold annually for three consecutive years between 2022 and 2024, and 863 tonnes in 2025, reflecting concerns over inflation, geopolitical fragmentation, and reserve diversification. That trend has continued into 2026. According to the World Gold Council, central banks added a net 244 tonnes of gold in the first quarter alone, a 3% increase from a year earlier, despite record-high prices earlier in the year.
Yet gold is no longer the only asset attracting sovereign attention. Governments are increasingly stockpiling critical minerals that underpin modern industry, defence systems, artificial intelligence infrastructure, and the energy transition. In a world shaped by trade disputes, export controls, and geopolitical rivalry, physical access to copper, lithium, nickel, rare earths, cobalt, and other strategic materials is becoming a matter of national security.
China has led this trend for years through a combination of state reserves, industrial policy, and control over refining capacity. Rather than simply holding financial assets, Beijing has focused on securing physical supply chains for metals essential to manufacturing, electric vehicles, semiconductors, and advanced technologies.
The United States is now responding in kind. Washington's newly announced “Project Vault” aims to establish a $12 billion strategic stockpile of critical minerals, supported by up to $10 billion in Export-Import Bank financing. The initiative is designed to reduce dependence on Chinese supply chains and create a strategic buffer for industries ranging from defence and aerospace to AI and electronics.
Similar efforts are emerging across Japan, South Korea, Europe, and the wider G7. Governments are investing in stockpiles, securing long-term offtake agreements, funding domestic processing facilities, and coordinating supply-chain resilience initiatives. The underlying message is clear, in an era of resource nationalism, physical control of strategic commodities increasingly matters as much as financial reserves. Gold remains a store of value, but copper, lithium, rare earths, and other critical minerals are becoming stores of industrial power.
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