81% of foreign exchange assets are invested in foreign securities

The Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) Report on Management of Foreign Exchange Reserves states that as of September, the percentage of India’s foreign currency assets invested in foreign securities increased to 81.43 percent from 80.76 percent in March.

By the end of September 2023, the percentage of funds held in deposits with the Bank for International Settlement (BIS) and other central banks had dropped from 14.82 percent at the end of March 2023 to 13.49 percent.

Nonetheless, the report indicated that the percentage of deposits held with foreign commercial banks increased from 4.42 percent in March to 5.08 percent in September.

According to the report, foreign currency assets increased from $509.69 billion at the end of March to $521.36 billion at the end of September.

At the end of September, the RBI’s gold reserves had grown to 800.79 tonnes (including 39.89 tonnes of gold deposits). At the end of March, there were 794.64 tonnes in the reserves. By value, gold’s percentage of total foreign exchange reserves dropped from 7.81 percent in March 2023 to 7.37 percent at the end of September.

372.84 tonnes of gold are held domestically, while 388.06 tonnes are held in safe custody with the Bank of England and BIS abroad.