The SPDR Gold Trust (NYSEMKT: GLD) has cratered along with the gold market. We will see if the bounce holds from Tuesday morning, but it has been hard to not see that the gain of 1.3% was closer to a 2.8% gain right after the open.

What is interesting is that it is not just the value of the trust that has fallen handily. The SPDR website shows that this exchange-traded product has lost major amounts of gold in the last week. We see that the SPDR website shows that the day-end holdings of gold came to 1,154.34 tonnes with a value of $51.757 billion.

This exchange traded fund (ETF) was down to just under $57.2 billion in total assets with some 1,158.56 tonnes in the data we saw over the weekend. As of last Thursday, the SPDR Gold Shares website showed that it had assets of $59.43 billion and 1,181.4 tonnes. The drop of $2.2 billion less in raw dollars and close to 22.8 tonnes less ahead of the weekend looked massive. Monday’s change on the SPDR site showed “only” a drop of just over 4.2 tonnes that were sold out in just one day, but the one-day value drop came to a loss of more than $5.4 billion in raw dollars as the ETF fell an unheard rate of almost 9% in one day.

To show how much the tonnes measured matters here, take a look at the table below from the World Gold Council that was released on Monday. It ranks the nations of the world by the official gold holdings (by tonnes) of each of their central banks.

We also have recently covered the six nations that are buying up all of the world’s gold, countered with a report about the $1,300 and $1,200 gold calls.

As you will see, if the SPDR Gold Trust (NYSEMKT: GLD) were magically transformed into a country or quasi-governmental agency, it would rank as number six in the world with its 1,154.34 tonnes of gold. That puts it ahead of the Bank of China’s 1,054.1 tonnes and ahead of Switzerland, which is just behind China with some 1,040.1 tonnes.

Thank you for reading! Have some feedback for us?
Contact the 24/7 Wall St. editorial team.