From the IMF (9/27/2024):
Figure 1: USD share of total reserves as reported (light blue), and USD share plus 60% of unallocated share (bright blue). Source: IMF, COFER, and author’s calculations.
While this reduction may seem drastic, it is interesting to note that the fastest turnaround was during the Trump administration. In any case, some context is useful.
Figure 2: Share of foreign exchange reserves held by central banks, in USD (blue), EUR (orange), DEM (tan squares), JPY (green), GBP (sky blue), Swiss francs (purple), CNY (red). For information from 1999 onwards, estimates based on COFER data, and allocation of unallocated reserves, are described in the text. Source: Chinn and Frankel (2007), IMF COFER accessed 10/1/2024, and author’s estimates.
The decrease from 2022Q3 can be accounted for by the decrease in the value of the US dollar (remember the shares are calculated using currency values evaluated using market exchange rates). Therefore, it is a little early to worry about the end of the dollar reserve currency hegemony.
For more on fx reserves holdings, from a central bank’s perspective, see Chinn et al. (2024), discussed here.
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