Thursday, December 06, 2007

Global top 20 countries International reserve assets - top 11 by country
Rank Country Current Reserves(USD$ bn) Percent of World
World Total $5,962.64 100%
1 China $1,433.61 24.04%
2 Japan $930.26 15.60%
3 Russia $407.11 6.83%
4 Taiwan $265.92 4.46%
5 India $262.90 4.41%
6 South Korea $260.14 4.36%
7 Eurozone $200.71 3.37%
9 Singapore $158.17 2.65%
8 Brazil $154.49 2.59%
10 Hong Kong $142.20 2.38%
11 Malaysia $97.78 1.64%

Source: Merrill Lynch Market Analysis, Bloomberg


Out of Top 11, 8 are from Asia, 2 from Europe and 1 from South America. We all know that Asian posses a high save rate, so it is not surprise to see that majority of them are from Asia. The hike of petroleum price boosts up Russia and Brazil's reserve, how about countries from Middle East like Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, UAE....etc? They are not even in the list of Top 20, where's the petrol monies go?