Currency and Gold Shares in International Reserves by Country: Insights from a New Dataset

This paper fills a gap in the data by country -- and the corresponding comparative analysis of patterns and trends over the past quarter century -- in the composition of foreign exchange (FX) reserves and monetary gold in total international reserves, typically held by central banks. The monetary mystique since the 1980s and the related unwillingness of central banks to disclose the composition of their official reserves until about the turn of the millennium have made such an area of study a terra incognita to the wider profession. Our ambition with this paper is to cast light, also providing the data online, on the relative importance and reshufflings of the US Dollar, the Euro, the Japanese Yen, the British Pound, the Australian Dollar, the Canadian Dollar, the Chinese Yuan or Renminbi and monetary gold as international reserves in the recent times of crises, wars and geopolitical reconfigurations. We find that the US Dollar retains its dominance inherited from the Bretton Woods system, but the Euro and perhaps the Yuan may increase their reserve shares in the decade ahead, with a return to gold in official reserves already obvious since at least the Global Financial Crisis. Our rich and diverse dataset, and the insights from it we highlight, is the most up-to-date and comprehensive overview of the field, covering 7 major currencies and 64 countries in terms of FX shares, and a subset of 50 for which we also provide the gold shares, in an unbalanced panel since the late 1990s.