Govt. optimistic of over $ 4 b gross official reserves with receipt of $ 780 m so far in December

President Ranil Wickremesinghe

Treasury Secretary Mahinda Siriwardena

The Government yesterday expressed confidence in boosting gross official reserves to over $ 4 billion by end 2023 with the receipt of $ 780 million so far in December. The Finance Ministry said following the completion of the First Review under the 48-month Extended Fund Facility (EFF) of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Government received the second tranche under the EFF, amounting to $ 337 million on 14 December 2023.  Subsequently, multilateral development banks also disbursed the tranches earmarked under several program financing channels. 

Accordingly, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) released a total of $ 200 million on 15 December 2023 for Financial Sector Stability and Reforms Program. Further, the World Bank released the second tranche of $ 250 million under Sri Lanka Resilience, Stability and Economic Turnaround (RESET) Development Policy Operation (DPO) on 20 December 2023.

The Finance Ministry said the Government has collectively received foreign exchange inflows of over $ 780 million during December 2023 and such inflows will further strengthen budget support and cushion Government’s gross financing needs in the period ahead.

“These notable inflows of foreign exchange to the Government will reinforce external buffers of the country. The gross official reserves are expected to surpass over $ 4 billion by the end of 2023, a level higher than anticipated earlier,” Finance Ministry said.

It said this significant foreign financing support by International Financial Institutions vouch for the satisfactory progress made by the Government of Sri Lanka on the implementation of the economic reform agenda.

“The Government remains committed to achieving sustainable economic recovery and ensuring public debt sustainability that will accrue benefits to the people in the period ahead,” the Finance Ministry added.