RBI data released on October 2 show the weekly fall widening to $18.3 billion. Gold holdings also fell in dollar terms, reversing the previous week’s small rise, while total reserves remained above their end-March level.
India’s weekly foreign exchange reserve losses have widened. Data released by the Reserve Bank of India on October 2 put total reserves at $747.557 billion for the week ended September 25, down $18.343 billion. Together with the previous week’s $14.881 billion decline, the two reported weekly falls amount to about $33.2 billion.
The change from the previous release is not just the size of the loss. Gold holdings also fell in dollar terms this time, alongside foreign currency assets. Both of the reserve pool’s largest components therefore pulled the total lower.
Gold joins the decline this time
The RBI’s weekly reserve table shows foreign currency assets falling by $15.570 billion to $615.411 billion. That component accounted for roughly 85% of the overall weekly decline. Gold holdings lost $2.591 billion in dollar value, bringing their reported value to $108.701 billion.
| Component | Reserves | Weekly change |
|---|---|---|
| Foreign currency assets | 615.411 | −15.570 |
| Gold | 108.701 | −2.591 |
| Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) | 18.642 | −0.097 |
| Reserve position in the IMF | 4.804 | −0.086 |
| Total | 747.557 | −18.343 |
The declines in SDR holdings and the IMF reserve position together came to $183 million. These figures describe the dollar value of reserve assets, rather than a count of banknotes in a vault. The RBI notes that small differences between components and the total can result from rounding.
Two-week losses reach $33.2 billion
In the reserve decline for the week ended September 18 that we covered earlier, gold’s dollar value had edged higher. The official table for that week recorded a $68 million increase in gold holdings. That contribution reversed in the latest release, while foreign currency assets remained the main source of the decline in both weeks.
The latest weekly fall is equivalent to roughly 2.4% of the previous reserve level. Even so, total reserves were still $56.450 billion above end-March and $47.322 billion higher than a year earlier. The short-term decline therefore sits alongside a longer-term increase in the same set of figures.
A reserve decline is not the same as dollar sales
Changes in the reserve stock and market intervention are different measures. Dollar-denominated reserve values can move with exchange rates and asset valuations as well as inflows and outflows. A fall in the weekly total does not establish that the RBI sold the same amount of dollars into the market. A decline in gold’s dollar value does not, by itself, establish that physical gold was sold either.
The latest bulletin identifies changes in reserve components without attributing them separately to transactions and valuation effects. Quantifying foreign exchange interventions to support the rupee requires the central bank’s separate purchase and sale figures.
