Montreal, Canada

The Mexican Central Bank reported buying 93.3 tons of gold bullion in February and March, extending a trend among major and emerging economy central banks as gold accumulation gains momentum.

U.S. dollar reserves as a percentage of total central bank assets has declined over the past decade as more countries reduce their dollar-based holdings and swap those assets for gold, EUR and other currencies.

Mexico joins other central banks like Argentina, Brazil, Russia, China and India as net buyers of gold bullion over the last five years. Some central banks, including Russia, have been staunch supporters of the anti-dollar trade, encouraging a new world currency unit and less reliance on the dollar as a unit measure of trade.

In the 1990s, many advanced economy central banks, including producers like Canada and Australia, were net sellers.

But the booby-prize for dumping gold at the absolute bottom goes to The Bank of England.

The United Kingdom sold a big stash of gold at around $250 an ounce – just ahead of gold’s secular low.

For the record, central banks don’t have a great track record making trades. In the late 1990s, many Gulf nation central banks purchased dollars against other currencies only to regret the switch by 2001 as the greenback peaked.

This time, however, I suspect the smarter central banks, like China and India, are accumulating gold because they see the writing on the wall for the world’s major currencies. They also hold very small percentages of gold relative to their reserves and that’s a trend that will continue to swing in gold’s favor.