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The Philippines’ gross international reserves (GIR) or United States (US) dollar stock declined to $106.2 billion, or about ₱6.1 trillion, as of end-March, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) reported.
This level decreased by $1.2 billion or over one percent from February’s $107.4 billion, mainly due to the government withdrawing dollars from the BSP to pay its foreign debt and the central bank’s foreign exchange (forex) transactions.
GIR refers to the BSP’s reserve assets, which include foreign investments, gold, foreign currency, a reserve position in the Washington-based multilateral lender International Monetary Fund (IMF), and special drawing rights (SDR).
According to the BSP, the latest GIR level offers a “robust” external liquidity buffer, enough to cover 7.3 months of imports and payments for services and income. This coverage weakened from the previous month’s 7.5-month period.
Likewise, the present GIR level is sufficient to cover short-term foreign debt by 3.7 times, based on residual maturity, reflecting the country’s financial stability.
Short-term debt based on residual maturity includes foreign debt originally due within a year, along with upcoming principal payments on medium- and long-term loans owed by both the public and private sectors within the next year.
GIR is generally considered sufficient if it can cover at least three months’ worth of the country’s imports, service payments, and primary income obligations.
The BSP said that the decline in GIR on a monthly basis was driven by the Marcos administration’s withdrawal of dollar funds from its account with the central bank to repay its foreign debts and “the BSP made foreign exchange transactions that affected the reserves.”
This reversed the previous month’s net dollar deposit, higher gold valuations, and the bulky earnings from the BSP’s offshore investments.
Specifically, foreign investments dropped by almost $1.6 billion to $88.6 billion from $90.1 billion as of end-February. Gold reserves, meanwhile, increase by more than $700 million to $12.76 billion, from $12.05 billion the previous month.
Net international reserves (NIR)—the difference between GIR and foreign reserve liabilities—fell by $1.2 billion to $106.2 billion at the end of March, down from $107.4 billion in February.
