India’s forex reserves cross $600 billion, says RBI

Earlier on 14 July, the RBI said that India’s forex jumped by $1,229 billion in the week that ended on 7 July, totaling $596,280 billion.

The country’s forex kitty had reached an all-time high of $645 billion in October 2021. Following this, the reserves have been declining with RBI deploying the forex kitty to defend the rupee amid pressures caused majorly by global developments.

“Foreign exchange reserves have rebounded from $524.5 billion on October 21, 2022, and now stand in excess of $600 billion, taking into account our forward assets,” RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das had said earlier.

“Strong software services export growth was witnessed across key verticals such as IT services, business process management (BPM), and engineering research and design (ER&D), supported by a rise in global capability centers (GCCs),” he added.

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According to the Weekly Statistical Supplement released by the RBI last Friday, for the week ended July 14, increased by $11,198 billion to $540,166 billion. In the week ended January 13 this year, the overall kitty had expanded by $ 10,417 billion.

“A major portion of the week-on-week jump in Forex reserves is driven by revaluation gains due to dollar weakness and reduction in US Treasury yields,” said Gaura Sen Gupta, India economist at IDFC FIRST Bank.

The rupee ended at 81.9450 on Friday, up 0.1% for the week.

With agency inputs.

Updated: 21 Jul 2023, 06:45 PM IST