KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 8): Bank Negara Malaysia's (BNM) international reserves rose US$1.9 billion to US$107.6 billion as at Dec 31, 2020, from US$105.7 billion as at Dec 15, 2020.

In a statement today, the central bank said the reserves position is enough to finance 8.6 months of retained imports and is 1.2 times the total short-term external debt.

Foreign currency reserves rose to US$99.7 billion from US$96.7 billion a fortnight ago.

Meanwhile, International Monetary Fund (IMF) reserves remained at US$1.4 billion, while gold stayed at US$2.4 billion. Special Drawing Rights, however, inched up to US$1.2 billion from US$1.1 billion.

The most significant change was in other reserve assets, which fell to US$2.9 billion from US$4.1 billion previously.

BNM's total assets dipped to RM487.914 billion as at Dec 31, from RM488.677 billion two weeks ago.