Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent delivered welcome news to Americans who have spent years wondering whether the nation’s gold reserves at Fort Knox remained where they belong, confirming in a Fox News interview that every ounce is present and accounted for. Appearing with host Jesse Watters, Bessent stated plainly that the United States holds the largest pile of gold in the world, worth more than 1 trillion dollars at current market value, and that the reserve is fully intact.

The comment resolves, at least for now, a question that has hung over American monetary policy circles for years. Speculation about whether the gold stored at the Fort Knox Bullion Depository in Kentucky had ever been quietly diminished, sold off or otherwise mismanaged has circulated for decades, fueled in part by the fact that no full, independent, physical audit of the depository has taken place since a limited congressional and press visit in 1974. Bessent’s remarks, delivered with characteristic confidence, ...