Bank Indonesia Governor Perry Warjoyo has said that Indonesia has adequate foreign exchange reserves to finance imports, to pay foreign debts and to mitigate possible outflows of foreign capital.

“The foreign exchange owned by Bank Indonesia is more than enough, not merely to finance imports and pay debts, but also to overcome any possible capital reversal,” Perry said in Jakarta on Wednesday as reported by tempo.co.id.

The central bank had US$118.3 billion in foreign exchange reserves in July, $1.5 billion lower than the previous month and $13.68 million lower than the foreign exchange reserves in January.

Perry said that the current foreign exchange reserves were equal to 6.7 to 6.9 months’ financing of imports and foreign debt payments.

He said that BI had bilateral swap arrangements with a number of countries, including with the Japanese central bank ($22.76 billion) and the Australian central bank ($10 billion).

“The existing bilateral swap arrangements function as buffer instruments,” Perry added. (bbn)