I would say that the Germans trying to get their gold back from New York have provoked a de facto default. The most obvious explanation as to why would it take seven (?) years to move many things each the size of a brick from point A to point B is that they just don't have them right now. Any security concerns offered as reasons not to move it in a timely matter, despite the matter of that diamond heist in Brussels in February, are simply red herrings.
And there is precedent. When nickel officially defaulted in 2006, the criminals at COMEX (aka CRIMEX) simply said, eh, ok, sellers pay buyers one percent per day until they can deliver. You can bet that gold would be going up more than one percent per day in that scenario, and CRIMEX wins again.
Yes, the Germany deal is what I was thinking about. Looked like a default to me.