XINHUA – The Philippines’ gross international reserves (GIR) rose to USD104 billion at the end of March from USD102 billion at the end of February, the Philippine central bank has said.
In a statement released on Saturday night, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) said the latest GIR level represents a more than adequate external liquidity buffer equivalent to 7.7 months’ worth of imports of goods and payments of services and primary income.
The central bank added that the March GIR level is about 6.1 times the country’s short-term external debt based on original maturity and 3.7 times based on residual maturity.
“The month-on-month increase in the GIR level reflected mainly the national government’s net foreign currency deposits with the BSP, upward valuation adjustments in the value of the BSP’s gold holdings due to the increase in the price of gold in the international market, and net income from the BSP’s investments abroad,” the BSP said.