In brief
India’s forex reserves dropped to $717.056 billion during the week ending October 30, a decline of $2.691 billion, marking the eighth consecutive week of falls. The drops involved foreign‑currency assets, gold, and special drawing rights, while the IMF position rose modestly. The underlying factors remain unclear.
India’s foreign exchange reserves fell to $717.056 billion during the week ending October 30, a decline of $2.691 billion, according to a weekly bulletin released by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Friday November 6.
The RBI bulletin noted that this was the eighth consecutive week that India's forex reserves had decreased. In the preceding week the reserves fell by $1.269 billion, the time‑series record showing a downward trend over the past 13 weeks.
Breaking down the decline, the RBI reported that foreign‑currency assets (FCAs) fell by $2.088 billion to $591.118 billion. Gold reserves also slipped, dropping $559 million to $102.591 billion.
Special drawing rights (SDRs) slipped $47 million, falling to $18.558 billion, whereas the country’s position in the International Monetary Fund increased by $3 million to $4.79 billion.
Looking back over the past two months, the RBI said that India’s forex reserves had dropped by nearly $68.65 billion, the largest month‑to‑month slide on record for the currency‑reserve balance.
Comparable figures from other industry sources corroborate the RBI data: the Opening Bell segment shows India’s FX reserves at $726.03 billion at the end of September, down from $734.60 billion the previous month, a decline of $4.22 billion.
Reports from a commodities‑focused source note that gold comprised 27 % of India’s official foreign reserves at the end of 2025, surpassing U.S. Treasuries at 22 % and the euro at 15 %.
The RBI has not published detailed explanations for the multi‑category decline. Analysts point to a combination of domestic and international factors—including capital outflows, export performance, and global currency movements—but the RBI has offered no explicit commentary.
India’s central bank has continued to engage in foreign‑asset purchases to support the rupee, but the net effect of those operations remains uncertain as they have not offset the broader decline in reserves noted in the bulletin.
What remains uncertain is the underlying cause of the week‑by‑week fall, how the RBI’s policy stance may adapt, and what the trajectory of the reserves will be in the subsequent months. The RBI has not yet clarified whether the decline reflects temporary market conditions or a longer‑term shift in the country’s reserve strategy.