KUALA LUMPUR (June 9): Malaysia’s international reserves rose to US$130.6 billion (RM530.17 billion) as at May 29, 2026, according to the central bank’s latest update on Tuesday. 

The reserves are sufficient to finance 4.6 months of imports of goods and services and cover 0.9 times the country’s short-term external debt, according to Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM). The latest figure is higher by US$1.1 billion than the US$129.5 billion recorded as at mid-May.

Short-term external borrowings refer to debts with a maturity of one year or less, largely made up of foreign currency liquidity operations by resident banks, and borrowings by multinational corporations, including foreign banks, from their overseas parent entities.

These borrowings are typically met through borrowers’ own external assets in the normal course of business, and do not impose claims on the central bank’s reserves.

The ringgit has been one of the best performing Asian currencies year-to-date and remained below 4.00 against the US dollar throughout May, allowing the central bank to accumulate reserves to its highest level since June 2014.

The local currency, however, began depreciating at the start of June and was last trading at 4.0610 against the greenback on Tuesday.

Among the key components, foreign currency reserves rose slightly to US$114.7 billion (May 15: US$113.8 billion), while the International Monetary Fund (IMF) reserve position remained unchanged at US$1.3 billion.

Meanwhile, the special drawing rights (SDRs) — reserve assets maintained by the IMF based on a basket of currencies — were unchanged at US$5.9 billion. Others that were also unchanged include gold holdings at US$6.4 billion and other reserve assets at US$2.3 billion.

BNM releases its international reserves data every two weeks.