CARACAS: Venezuela withdrew some $467 million from an IMF holding account in October, according to information posted on the fund’s web-site, as the OPEC nation seeks to improve the liquidity of its reserves amid low oil prices and a severe recession.
Venezuela holds part of its reserves with the International Monetary Fund in an instrument called Special Drawing Rights (SDR), a basket of international currencies made up of the euro, Japanese yen, pound sterling and U.S. dollar.
The withdrawal will allow Venezuela to use the funds for imports or debt service, but does not change its total reserve holdings as SDRs are already accounted for.
The country’s international reserves as of Thursday stood at $14.819 billion. The central bank’s most recent financial statements, corresponding to May, showed that 58 percent of reserves were held in gold.
The central bank did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Venezuela in June sold $1.5 billion in SDRs and $380 million in April, according to IMF data. As of October, its balance of SDRs stood at an equivalent to $806 million based on the current SDR exchange rate of 1.39 per dollar.
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