Comparing declared exports with counterpart declared imports is the crudest possible test of integrity, and gold fails it consistently and at scale.
The gap is structural
Transit hubs re-export without attributing origin. Refined metal loses the identity of its feedstock. Some producing states have no practical capacity to weigh what leaves.
Reconciliation is possible
It requires origin attribution to survive refining, which is a documentation standard rather than a technology problem, and one the industry has resisted for exactly that reason.
