“The bank of Russia is not committed to buying any particular amount of gold,” the bank said. “Nor is there any official target amount of gold purchases. The bank buys gold at a market price, and its buying intentions completely depend on the market conditions.”

And despite Russia’s frequent criticism of the dollar’s status as an international currency, the bank statement said its gold policies were based purely on its investment judgment of the value of gold as a reserve. “It doesn’t result from the wish to diversify away from any particular asset or currency,” the bank said.

Gold as a share of Russia’s central bank’s reserves has actually increased — to 7.8 percent of the total this year, from 5.3 percent in January 2010. But nearly all of that gain is because of the rising value of the gold over that period.

The Russian bank’s gold holdings are far below the global average of 12.1 percent as reported by the International Monetary Fund. And Russia’s portion is minuscule compared with the United States, which holds 74 percent of its reserves in gold, according to the Treasury Department.

The Russian central bank now, as before the economic crisis, keeps about 50 percent of its reserves in United States dollars. It needs those assets on a daily basis to intervene in currency markets to smooth out fluctuations in monetary flows from Russia’s main export of oil and natural gas, which are priced in dollars.

Russia’s gold behavior seems grounded in the country’s hard-learned lessons about commodity markets. Since its financial crisis in 1998, Russia has enacted policies intended to counterbalance the historical cycles of commodity prices to protect the economy during downturns.