FX reserves rise for 10th straight month in April

South Korea's foreign exchange reserves reached a record US$355.85 billion at the end of April, up $1.5 billion from a month earlier, the central bank said Thursday.

The FX reserves increased for the 10th straight month in April, the Bank of Korea (BOK) said.

The BOK said the FX reserves grew on the back of a rise in the value of non-dollar assets and investment profit.

Securities took the lion’s share of $326.03 billion or 91.6 percent of the total FX reserves, followed by deposits denominated in overseas currencies ($18.9 billion or 5.3 percent), gold bullion ($4.79 billion or 1.3 percent), International Monetary Fund (IMF) special drawing rights ($3.51 billion or 1 percent) and IMF reserve positions ($2.51 billion or 0.7 percent).

As of the end of March, South Korea ranked seventh in terms of FX reserves in the world. China retained its top spot with $3,948.1 billion, followed by Japan ($1,279.3 billion) and Switzerland ($546 billion).

Park Sae-jin swatchsjp@ajunews.com