Exchange Fund Abridged Balance Sheet and Currency Board Account

The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) announced today (Friday) that the total assets of the Exchange Fund amounted to HK$1,065.1 billion at 30 September 2005.

The figure is included in the Exchange Fund Abridged Balance Sheet, which is released monthly together with the Currency Board Account.

At the end of September 2005 the total assets of the Exchange Fund, at HK$1,065.1 billion, were HK$3.9 billion higher than at the end of August 2005. Both foreign currency assets and Hong Kong dollar assets increased, by HK$0.9 billion and HK$3.0 billion respectively.

The increase in foreign currency assets was due mainly to an increase in Certificates of Indebtedness and income from foreign currency assets, which were partly offset by valuation losses on foreign currency investments. The increase in Hong Kong dollar assets was due mainly to an increase in bank borrowings and valuation gains in the market value of Hong Kong equities held by the Exchange Fund, which were partly offset by fiscal drawdowns.

The Currency Board Account shows that the Monetary Base at the end of September 2005 was HK$280.7 billion, an increase of HK$3.1 billion, or 1.1%, from the end of August 2005. The increase was due mainly to an increase in Certificates of Indebtedness.

The Backing Assets increased by HK$2.7 billion, or 0.9%, to HK$311.9 billion. The increase was attributable mainly to the corresponding increase in Certificates of Indebtedness in the Monetary Base and income from investments, which were partly offset by revaluation losses on investments. At the end of September, the backing ratio stood at 111.12%, compared with 111.36% at the end of August.

Attachment

Annex 1 : Abridged Balance Sheet of the Exchange Fund
Annex 2 : Currency Board Account

For further enquiries, please contact:

Jasmin Fung, Manager (Press), at 2878 8246 or
Hing-Fung Wong, Resource Co-ordinator, at 2878 1802

Hong Kong Monetary Authority
28 October 2005

At present, four press releases relating to the Exchange Fund's data are issued by the HKMA each month. Three of these releases are issued to disseminate monetary data in accordance with the International Monetary Fund's Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS). The fourth press release, on the Exchange Fund's Abridged Balance Sheet and Currency Board Account, is made in accordance with the HKMA's policy of maintaining a high level of transparency. For the month of October 2005, the scheduled dates for issuing the press releases are as follows: