Indonesia: RI foreign exchange reserve dips to US$124.3b in September

• Oct 08, 2019

Indonesia’s foreign exchange reserve slightly fell to US$124.3 billion in September after hitting a 17-months high of $126.4 billion in the previous month, Bank Indonesia (BI) announced on Monday.

The decline was mainly driven by payments of the government’s external debt as well as reduced deposits of banks’ foreign exchange in the central bank’s account, BI spokesman Junanto Herdiawan said in a statement.

The latest figure was enough to finance a little over seven months of imports or seven months of imports and payment of the government’s short-term external debt and stood above the international adequacy standards of around three months of imports.

Junanto added that the central bank believed the current reserve figure would be able to support the external sector’s resiliency while also maintaining macroeconomic and financial system stability, while the outlook for the reserve going forward was also positive.

“Going forward, BI considered the foreign exchange reserve to be adequate with the support of [economic] stability and positive prospects of the economy,” Junanto said in the statement.

Source: https://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2019/10/07/ri-foreign-exchange-reserve-dips-to-us124-3b-in-september.html