KUALA LUMPUR (April 22): Malaysia’s international reserves rose by US$2.2 billion as at mid-April compared with end-March, said Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) on Wednesday.

In a statement, the central bank said foreign reserves stood at US$128.8 billion as at April 15, up from US$126.6 billion as at March 31.

Among the reserve components, foreign currency reserves increased to US$112.9 billion from US$110.8 billion, while other reserve assets edged up to US$2.3 billion from US$2.2 billion.

Special drawing rights — reserve assets maintained by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) based on a basket of currencies — were unchanged at US$5.9 billion. Gold holdings were also unchanged at US$6.4 billion.

Malaysia’s reserve position with the IMF remained steady at US$1.3 billion.

“The reserves position is sufficient to finance 4.7 months of imports of goods and services, and is 0.9 times the total short-term external debt,” said BNM in the statement. 

The short-term external debt comprises borrowing from non-residents with maturity of one year or less. It is accounted mostly by resident banks in connection with their foreign currency liquidity operations and multinational companies (including foreign banks) borrowing from their overseas parent/headquarters. 

These obligations can be met in the normal course of operations from their external asset holdings and do not pose any claims on BNM international reserves.