Market data, ASM data, illicit-flows research and transparency disclosures on gold. Edition-based datasets carry their current edition, reference year and cadence, so a stale edition reads as stale.
Two locked corrections apply across this section: the widely cited ~45M ASM jobs figure covers all minerals, never gold alone, and the "ASM is about 20% of mined gold" share traces to a single 2017 origin, re-cited since.
The World Gold Council’s data portal: demand and supply series, central-bank reserves and monthly purchases, ETF flows and the Qaurum tool. Per WGC/Metals Focus, FY2025 was the first 5,000+ t year including OTC (US$555bn, 53 price records); Q1 2026 reached 1,231 t, a record US$193bn.
Per WGC/Metals Focus; the WGC’s own estimates, treated as the industry standard.
LBMA market datasets: the LBMA Gold Price (IBA-administered), monthly vault holdings (end-May 2026: 9,392 t of gold, about US$1.4tn), clearing statistics, LBMA-i trade data via Nasdaq, and annual aggregate country-of-origin data (latest published: 2023 data in the 2025 report).
A record 76 central banks surveyed between 2026-02-05 and 2026-05-19: 89% expect global gold reserves to rise, and a record 45% expect their own to rise. Published 16 June 2026.
The global ASM data platform: country profiles and the State of the ASM Sector reports (2019, 2020, 2023). Delve is the lineage of the widely cited ~45M ASM jobs figure, which covers all minerals, not gold alone.
Artisanal mine-site mapping in eastern DRC since 2009, gold-dominant, with armed-interference and taxation data on an open-data dashboard. In December 2025 IPIS mapped ASM inside the Kibali concession (~5,500 miners).
Swissaid’s 2024 flagship estimates 321-474 t/yr of undeclared African ASM gold and 435 t smuggled out of Africa in 2022 (about US$30.7bn), 80-85% of it to the UAE. The May 2025 African Gold Report covers Sudan-UAE routes (29 t direct in 2024), with country pages at africangoldreport.org. A separate Swissaid analysis found Switzerland imported 316 t of gold (about CHF 27bn) from the UAE alone in the first nine months of 2025, more than double usual annual volumes (Swissaid; this is UAE-origin, not total Swiss imports).
Single producer, modelled from trade-gap analysis; widely method-checked.
An observatory line on illicit gold. "Commodity, currency, crime" (2026-06-08) frames illicit gold as a conflict-finance backbone, with Sudan, the Sahel and the DRC among the highest-risk settings, and calls for mandatory due diligence.
Gold-relevant transparency reporting in Ghana, Senegal, Mali (2024 report published 2026-03-25), Niger and Cameroon, where 269 kg of SONAMINES gold went unaccounted for in 2023 data and a presidential commission followed in February 2026. Caveat: the top five producers (China, Russia, Australia, Canada, US) do not implement EITI.
A March 2025 research report on the wartime gold-trade ecosystem in Sudan, identifying the UAE as the principal outlet.