World governments piling up currency reserves

Countries are piling up currency reserves at a pace of nearly 20 percent a year in an environment of low interest rates and high uncertainty, International Monetary Fund figures showed Friday. Global official foreign exchange reserves at the end of the second quarter of this year hit $10.08 trillion, 19.8 percent up from $8.99 trillion a year earlier, and 3.9 percent higher than the previous quarter, according to the IMF.
World export power China was the main accumulator of foreign reserves, increasing its rainy-day fund to $3.197 trillion by June, $743 billion or 30.2 percent higher than a year earlier, according to Beijing''s figures. Emerging and developing economies together, including China, added $1.358 trillion to their reserves in the year to June, up 24.7 percent in the year.
Advanced economies, many of them suffering high deficits and weak growth, boosted their reserves by 10.4 percent, or $306 billion. For the countries which disclose the composition of their reserves - slightly over half the total, and not including China - the US dollar fell in weighting over the year to June, to 60.2 percent from 62.6 percent.
The euro rose to 26.7 percent from 26.2 percent. There were slight increases in the percent of holdings in Japanese yen and British pounds, while the "other currencies" category rose to 4.86 percent of the total from 3.76 percent.