The gross international reserves of the Philippines climbed to a 28-month high in July 2024 on higher gold holdings and foreign investments of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas.
The BSP said the GIR amounted to $105.65 billion as of end-July 2024, up from $105.19 billion in the previous month. It was also higher than $99.95 billion registered a year ago.
Data show that the end-July GIR level was the highest since it reached $107.3 billion in March 2022.
The BSP’s reserve assets consist of foreign investments, gold, foreign exchange, reserve position in the International Monetary Fund and special drawing rights.
“The month-on-month increase in the GIR level reflected mainly the upward valuation adjustments in the BSP gold holdings due to the increase in the price of gold in the international market, net income from the BSP’s investments abroad and the national government’s net foreign currency deposits with the BSP,” the BSP said.
It said the latest GIR level represents a more than adequate external liquidity buffer equivalent to 7.8 months’ worth of imports of goods and payments of services and primary income.
The BSP said that by convention, the GIR is viewed to be adequate if it can finance at least three-months’ worth of the country’s imports of goods and payments of services and primary income.
It said the latest GIR was also about 6.1 times the country’s short-term external debt based on original maturity and 3.8 times based on residual maturity.
Short-term debt based on residual maturity refers to outstanding external debt with original maturity of one year or less, plus principal payments on medium- and long-term loans of the public and private sectors falling due within the next 12 months.
The BSP said the level of GIR is considered adequate, if it provides at least 100-percent cover for the payment of the country’s foreign liabilities, public and private, falling due within the immediate 12-month period.
The net international reserves, which refers to the difference between the BSP’s reserve assets and reserve liabilities which is the short-term foreign debt and credit and loans from the IMF, also increased by $460 million to $105.62 billion as of end-July 2024 from the end-June 2024 level of $105.16 billion.
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