BoG Put ¢4.69bn into Gold-for-oil, Lost Over GH¢2.1bn With No Impact — Audits show
This morning, I’ve been going through the 2024 Audited Annual Report and Financial Statements of the Bank of Ghana and what it reveals about Ghana’s gold programmes is too important to ignore.
According to the audited 2024 financials, the Bank of Ghana recorded a significant operating loss of GH¢9.49 billion (Approx $660 million) in 2024. A key driver of that loss was the Government’s Gold-for-Oil (G4O) Programme, into which the Bank committed GH¢4.69 billion (Approx $324.12 million) in seed capital.
Despite this huge investment, the programme produced exchange losses of GH¢1.82 billion in 2024, following an additional GH¢317 million loss in 2023 on the same programme (Bank of Ghana 2024 Audited Financial Statements).
These figures, drawn directly from the Bank’s own audited accounts, show that the G4O programme under the previous administration carried massive financial costs and materially contributed to the Bank’s operating losses over consecutive years. Yet what makes these losses more troubling is that they delivered no corresponding macroeconomic benefits.
During the same period when the Bank was absorbing these billions in losses, Ghana endured some of the worst economic conditions in recent history, extremely high inflation, a sharply depreciating cedi, soaring interest rates, and an uncontrolled rise in the cost of goods and services.
In effect, the country paid heavily but received little in return: neither price stability nor currency strength nor meaningful relief for ordinary households. Today, the contrast could not be sharper.
Under the current administration’s gold and reserve strategy, the Bank of Ghana’s programme costs are being used deliberately as economic trade-offs to achieve broader national objectives including reserve accumulation, export growth, currency stability and macroeconomic recovery. Instead of absorbing losses without impact, Ghana is now converting those costs into real economic gains. The results are already visible in the data.
Inflation has fallen drastically, now recorded at 6.3% in November 2025, the lowest level in years and back within the Bank of Ghana’s target range. The policy rate has been reduced significantly as price pressures ease, while the cedi has stabilised relative to the extreme volatility of the past.
These improvements are not abstract: they are being felt in lower fuel prices, easing transport costs, moderating food prices and improved business confidence. For ordinary Ghanaians, this means something very simple but powerful: more money stays in their pockets. When inflation drops and the currency stabilises, the cost of living stops spiralling.
When interest rates come down, businesses can expand, and households can plan. And when reserves and exports strengthen, the country avoids costly currency crises that drain public finances.
In this light, the so-called “losses” now appearing on the Bank of Ghana’s books from gold trading are not evidence of failure. They are the price of economic stability, a strategic investment that is already saving the nation billions and delivering tangible improvements in people’s lives. The difference between then and now is not merely in the numbers recorded, but in the results achieved.
Source: Richard Eduku
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