You bought it once at X price, it's realized when you sell it, it's unrealized while "open"
If they held it for 100 years and finally sold it, then profit/loss is realized now
If they held it for 100 years and finally sold it, then profit/loss is realized now
Edit: wtf is going on with you for downvoting a question…
Now they still have the same amount of gold but they "realized" a gain of 11 billion. They don't have that much cash left after the repurchase but now they say they have X Euros worth of gold which is 11 billion more than before.
So no they didn't make a profit from this as gold is higher on both sides of the Atlantic than last time they did their accounting updates.
Why was it worth “X minus 11 billions”?
And let's say that I regret it. I decide that I really want to hold some gold, so I take the $470,000 and buy another 100-ounce gold bar.
The situation was that I had a gold bar worth $470,000 with a taxable basis of $3500. Now the situation is that I have a gold bar worth $470,000 with a taxable basis of $470,000, and I owe the IRS taxes on $466,500 of capital gains.
TL;DR: Selling and re-buying the same asset gives you the accumulated gains, and resets the price basis.