Italy presses ahead with claim on central bank's $300 billion gold pile

By Giuseppe Fonte

ROME (Reuters) -Italian ruling lawmakers intend to press ahead with a claim that the central bank's $300 billion in gold reserves belong to the state, a senator said on Thursday, despite widespread concern that the move could breach EU rules.

Senator Lucio Malan, from Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's Brothers of Italy party, told broadcaster Radio 24 the initiative was aimed at preventing the gold reserves from being improperly used in the future.

"Not even the Bank of Italy can do whatever it wants with the gold," Malan said.

WORLD'S THIRD-LARGEST GOLD STOCKPILE

The Bank of Italy sits on the world's third-largest national gold stockpile, behind only the United States and Germany. Its 2,452 metric tons of gold are equivalent to around 13% of national output.

A government official told Reuters Italy would seek an opinion from both the Bank of Italy and the European Central Bank (ECB), before passing legislation on the matter.

Malan, along with four other party members, has presented to parliament an amendment to the 2026 budget stating that "the gold reserves, managed and held by the Bank of Italy, belong to the state, on behalf of the Italian people."

Politicians of all parties have called in the past 20 years for clarification of the ownership of the gold, with an eye on possibly selling it at a later stage to cut Italy's public debt or find resources for tax cuts and spending hikes.

In commenting on a similar initiative in 2019, the ECB warned that any restriction on central bank autonomy, such as in the management of gold reserves, would be incompatible with EU treaties.

The statute of the European System of Central Banks (ESCB) prohibits central bankers from seeking or taking instructions from EU institutions or member states.

Malan denied any coalition plan to sell the gold, arguing his party just wanted to defuse the risk that the reserves could be sold off, without giving further details.

"It is one thing to establish that reserves cannot be used because they are held as collateral, but it is quite another thing to say they belong to someone else," he said, adding that coalition allies from other parties also backed the initiative.

The Bank of Italy said on its website that the gold could be used as collateral to obtain loans or, as a last resort, sold on the market to buy euros to support its value.

(Reporting by Giuseppe Fonte in Rome, additional reporting by Valentina Za in Milan, editing by Gavin Jones)