The foreign exchange (FX) reserves held by Serbia's central bank rose to 14.2 billion euro ($17.2 billion) at the end of May, up by 184.1 million euro on a monthly comparison basis, the National Bank of Serbia (NBS) said. The May increase in gross FX reserves is attributable to the net purchases on the domestic market, donations, reserves management and other sources, the central bank said in a statement on Tuesday. The volume of trading on the Inter-bank Foreign Exchange Market (IFEM) in May decreased to 462.4 million euro, down by 156.5 million euro month-on-month, the NBS said.
The FX reserves held by NBS as at end-May were enough to cover about six months’ worth of imports of goods and services, NBS added. In May, the dinar remained unchanged against the euro, and the NBS intervened by purchasing 45 million euro on the interbank market and selling 5 million euro in order to tame excessive daily volatility of the exchange rate. Net FX reserves (total reserves less banks’ FX balances on account of required reserves and other requirements) amounted to 11.7 billion euro at end-May, up from 11.6 billion euro in April.