Pension Funds Turn to Gold for Diversification and Risk Management

The World Gold Council has studied four pension funds and retirement systems in the Netherlands, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia that have allocated a portion of their investment portfolios to gold.

The objective of these allocations is to diversify portfolios and manage risk, particularly inflation and market disruption risks. The size of the gold allocation varies across the funds, ranging from approximately 2% to 5%, with different investment instruments and objectives.

In the Netherlands, pension fund PDN invested in physical gold in 2020 due to concerns about government bond yields being negative and potential inflation in subsequent years. It opted for Good Delivery bars weighing around 12.5 kilograms each with a minimum purity of 99.5%, allowing for low-cost trading.

In the United States, Fairfax County Employee Retirement Systems maintains a 3% gold allocation through futures, while in the UK, NOW: Pensions' growth fund held 2.4% of its assets as gold at the end of March 2026.