India’s foreign exchange reserves fell by $2.470 billion, during the week ended August 20. According to the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) weekly statistical supplement, the reserves decreased to $616.895 billion from $619.365 billion reported for the week ended August 13.

India’s forex reserves comprise foreign currency assets (FCAs), gold reserves, special drawing rights (SDRs), and the country’s reserve position with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

On a weekly basis, FCAs, the largest component of the forex reserves, edged lower by $3.365 billion to $573.009 billion.

However, the value of the country’s gold reserves rose by $913 million to $37.249 billion.

On the other hand, the SDR value slipped by $3 million to $1.541 billion.

In addition, the country’s reserve position with the IMF decreased by $15 million to $5.096 billion.

Separately, Indian shares were largely unchanged in choppy trading on Friday, with banking stocks dropping as investors eyed Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s speech to get clues on the central bank’s timeline to taper its asset purchase programme.

By 0458 GMT, the blue-chip NSE Nifty 50 index was up 0.02% at 16,649.55, while the benchmark S&P BSE Sensex fell 0.07% to 55,939.36.

Main indexes in India’s liquidity-abundant market hit all-time highs earlier this week as the country authorised more COVID-19 vaccines to ramp up its immunisation program, setting up the Nifty 50 for a weekly gain.