A portion of Azerbaijan’s Special Drawing Rights (SDR) reserves at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has been invested for income-generating purposes, the Central Bank of Azerbaijan (CBA) said in response to an inquiry from APA-Economics.
It was noted that 37.62 million SDR, equivalent to approximately 49 million US dollars, has been invested by the Central Bank in other financial instruments within the framework of foreign exchange reserve management aimed at increasing returns. As a result, the country's SDR holdings at the IMF decreased from 451.49 million to 413.87 million SDR.
The CBA emphasized that, starting in 2024, it began investing SDR reserves as part of its reserve management policy for the first time. This approach is intended to ensure more efficient management of reserves and to realize additional income opportunities.
It was also added that, depending on favorable conditions in international markets, the practice of investing SDR resources is expected to continue in the future.
For reference, SDR (Special Drawing Rights) is an international reserve asset created by the IMF. While SDR is not a currency, it is held by member countries as a reserve asset and can be exchanged for freely usable currencies such as the US dollar, euro, pound sterling, yen, and yuan when needed. SDRs are allocated free of charge to member countries by the IMF according to their quotas and form part of central banks’ foreign exchange reserves.
