Serbia's gross foreign exchange reserves increased 7.9% y/y to EUR 10.7bn at end-August 2013 accelerating from a 5.7% y/y rise the month before, the central bank (NBS) said in a statement. They covered more than seven months of imports and the M1 money supply by 346%, the bank said.

The gross FX reserves edged down 0.3% m/m in August, after increasing 0.4% m/m in July.

The largest outflows resulted from the payment of IMF debt worth EUR 100.2mn as well as from the settlement of liabilities to other foreign creditors (EUR 60.4mn), payment of maturing euro-denominated government securities (EUR 40mn) and servicing frozen FX savings (EUR 25.8mn).

The biggest inflows, on the other hand, came from credit disbursement and grants from the European Investment Bank and the Council of Europe Development Bank worth a combined EUR 41.1mn. Allocations under the bank’s FX required reserves totalled EUR 39.9mn, whereas income from the sale of euro-denominated government securities on the domestic market amounted to EUR 25.8mn.

Net FX reserves, defined as FX reserves less banks’ required reserves and IMF drawings, totalled EUR 6.991bn at end-August, broadly unchanged on the month.

August trading volumes on the interbank foreign exchange market shrank by EUR 61.1mn m/m to EUR 615.1mn. This brought the overall market turnover in January-August at EUR 6.6bn.

In August the local dinar currency weakened against the euro by 0.5% m/m in nominal terms, after strengthening 0.3% the month before, the bank read. The central bank did not intervene to mitigate the excessive daily volatility of the exchange rate in August.