India’s Forex Reserve Soars To $600 Billion In July: RBI

India’s forex exchange reserve has ballooned by $12.74 billion to $609.02 billion in the week ended on July 14, 2023, as per data released by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).

Earlier, the RBI said that India's forex jumped by $1.229 billion in the week that ended on 7 July, totaling $596.280 billion. The country’s forex kitty had touched all-time highs of $645 billion in October 2021.

However, the kitty has been declining since then as the central bank has been deploying the foreign kitty to defend against the rupee amid pressures caused majorly by global developments.

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“Foreign exchange reserves have rebounded from $524.5 billion on October 21, 2022, and now stand in excess of $600 billion , taking into account our forward assets," RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das had said earlier.

He further added, “Strong software services export growth was witnessed across key verticals such as IT services, business process management (BPM), and engineering research and design (ER&D), supported by a rise in global capability centres (GCCs).”

As per the Weekly Statistical Supplement, which was released by RBI last week, revealed that the kitty has increased by $11.198 billion to $540.166 billion for the week ended July 14.

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"A major portion of the week-on-week jump in Forex reserves is driven by revaluation gains due to dollar weakness and reduction in U.S. Treasury yields," Gaura Sen Gupta, India economist at IDFC FIRST Bank, was quoted as saying by Livemint.

The rupee ended at 81.9450 on Friday, up 0.1% for the week, on Friday, July 21.