Down by $11 Bn, Forex Reserves Stood at $698 Bn Last Week

The decrease days after touching an all-time high was largely due to a decrease in gold stocks.

The Wire Staff

The decrease days after touching an all-time high was largely due to a decrease in gold stocks.

down by 11 bn forex reserves stood at 698 bn last week

Foreign currency notes. Photo: Wikimedia Commons/epSos.de. CC BY 2.0

New Delhi: India's foreign exchange reserves declined by $11.4 billion over the week ending March 20 to $698.35 billion, largely driven by a decrease in its stocks of gold, the RBI's weekly statistical supplement released on Friday (March 27) showed.

The value of its gold reserves stood at around $117.2 billion on March 20, having declined by some $13.5 billion over the preceding week. India's foreign currency assets however went up by $2.13 billion to $557.7 billion over the same period.

Special drawing rights, which are supplementary foreign exchange reserve assets defined and maintained by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), went down by $65 million to $18.6 billion, while India's reserve position in the IMF was worth $4.83 billion, marking an increase of $19 million between March 7 and 20.

In the week that ended on February 27 – a day before the US and Israel launched attacks on Iran – India's foreign exchange reserves had touched an all-time high $728.49 billion.

Since the attacks the rupee has tumbled to a record 94.8125 to the dollar. Reuters reported on Friday that foreign investors sold an overall $12.14 billion in Indian shares after February 28 in what is the largest monthly outflow ever.

This article went live on March twenty-eighth, two thousand twenty six, at forty-one minutes past eleven at night.

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