KUALA LUMPUR: The international reserves of Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) amounted to US$98 billion (equivalent to RM433.3 billion) as at May 31, 2017 compared with US$97.3 billion (equivalent to RM430.5 billion) registered as at May 15, 2017. In a statement, BNM said the reserves position was sufficient to finance 8.1 months of retained imports and was 1.1 times the short-term external debt. The main components of the international reserves were foreign currency reserves (US$91.6 billion), International Monetary Fund reserves position (US$0.8 billion), special drawing rights (SDRs) (US$1.1 billion), gold (US$1.6 billion) and other reserve assets (US$2.9 billion).
The central bank’s assets included gold and foreign exchange and other reserves including SDRs (RM433.32 billion), Malaysian government papers (RM3.93 billion), deposits with financial institutions (RM6.07 billion), loans and advances (RM7.81 billion), land and buildings (RM2.11 billion) and other assets (RM7.29 billion). Its liabilities comprised paid-up capital (RM100 million), reserves (RM150.05 billion), currency in circulation (RM100.47 billion), deposits by financial institutions (RM173.57 billion), deposits by Federal government (RM12.04 billion), other deposits (RM1.24 billion), Bank Negara papers (RM9.50 billion), allocation of SDRs (RM8.08 billion) and other liabilities (RM5.51 billion).