Russian investment in US Treasuries down to $88.4 bln in Dec
WASHINGTON. Feb 16 (Interfax) - Russian investment in US Treasuries fell to $88.4 billion from $89.7 billion during December, says a joint report by the Russian Finance Ministry and the U.S. Federal Reserve System.
This was the 14th monthly drop in succession: the investment stood at $176.3 billion in October 2010.
The Central Bank of Russia has said its international reserves fell 2.3% or $12.261 billion during December to $498.649 billion from $510.91 billion.
Russia became one of the main UST investors in 2008, when it boosted this investment 3.5-fold to $116.4 billion from $32.6 billion.
China had the biggest UST holdings as of the end of December 2011 with $1.1007 trillion ($1.133 trillion at the end of November), followed by Japan with $1.042 trillion ($1.039 trillion). The UK was third with $414.8 billion ($425.9 billion), the group of oil exporters (Ecuador, Venezuela, Indonesia, Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Algeria, Gabon, Libya and Nigeria) fourth with $233.5 billion and Brazil was fifth with $206.9 billion.