Starting April 1, Russia will be suspending its domestic gold purchases:

"Since April 1, 2020, the Bank of Russia has suspended the purchase of gold in the domestic precious metals market.

Further decisions on the purchase of gold will be made depending on the development of the situation in the financial market..." Russia's central bank said.

In recent years, as Kitco notes, the Russian central bank has dominated the gold market, consistently increasing its gold reserves every month for the last three years. According to data from the World Gold Council, the Russian central bank bought 158.1 tons last year. The WGC data shows that the central bank bought 8.1 tons of gold in January.

Although Russia will not be adding to its gold reserves in the near future, analysts are not expecting the central bank to start selling its gold anytime soon.

Gold accounts for over 20% of Russian international reserves, which is a high level historically and compared with other central banks.

"The central bank probably doesn't want to increase gold's share in reserves, while the size of reserves is falling," said Tatiana Evdokimova, an analyst at Nordea Bank in Moscow.