This paper focuses on the interactions between public debt policy and foreign exchange reserve management. We found that, although foreign currency debt issuance can contribute significantly to the growth of foreign exchange reserves, it can cause serious difficulties in the assessment of...

Official holdings of US dollar reserves are partly invested outside the United States. These offshore investments do not strictly speaking finance the US current account, but do support the US dollar. Offshore holdings grow fast when intervention is large

The increasing size and concentration of official foreign exchange reserves after years of continued expansion, especially since the Asian crisis, have led to renewed interest in the way reserve management decisions are taken and in their possible impact on financial markets. Reserve management...

In recent years, issues related to the management of foreign exchange reserves have gained prominence, and reserve management practices have evolved rapidly. Against this background, the Monetary and Economic Department of the Bank for International Settlements organised an ad hoc meeting of...

Understanding the global financial crisis and the stresses on bank balance sheets requires a perspective on banks’ international investment positions and how these positions were funded across currencies and counterparties. This special feature uses the BIS international banking statistics to...