India's forex reserves hit record $729 billion on sustained capital inflows

MUMBAI: India’s foreign exchange reserves climbed to a record high of $729.33 billion in the week to August 21, central bank data showed on Friday, boosted by persistent inflows from regulatory measures to boost the country’s balance of payments.

India’s FX pile has risen for eight straight weeks, jumping by about $63 billion during this period and surpassing the previous peak hit in February.

In June, India unveiled a raft of measures to boost dollar inflows, including discounted hedging facilities for overseas borrowings by state-run firms and banks, and a free-of-cost hedging facility for banks to raise overseas FX deposits.

The Reserve Bank of India received nearly $73 billion under these schemes between June 5 and August 21, including about $65 billion from non-resident Indian deposits.

The scale of inflows prompted the central bank to bring forward the closure of its deposit hedging facility by a month to August end.

“The rise in FX reserves is a combination of RBI buying dollars during that week and the rest is revaluation gain. The dollar purchase is led by FCNR-B swap window with banks pushing for deposits before the window closes,” said Gaura Sen Gupta, chief economist at IDFC First Bank.

India’s forex reserves climb past $700 billion on robust inflows

For the week ended August 21, the reserves jumped $12.4 billion from the previous week, led by a $9.5 billion gain in the central bank’s foreign currency assets, and a $2.8 billion rise in the value of gold holdings.

The RBI’s frequent interventions in the foreign exchange market to support the rupee have likely offset the impact of some of the overseas dollar inflows, bankers said.

Changes in foreign currency assets, expressed in dollar terms, include the effect of appreciation or depreciation of other currencies held in the reserves. Foreign exchange reserves also include India’s reserve tranche position in the IMF.

Foreign exchange reserves (in million U.S. dollars)