Russia could use part of available gold, forex reserves to pay for imports if necessary - Nabiullina

MOSCOW. April 21 (Interfax) - Russia could use some of the country's available gold and forex reserves in order to pay for imports if necessary, Central Bank Governor Elvira Nabiullina said in the State Duma.

"The gold and foreign exchange reserves are actually the tool that allows us to protect our economy from such external threats at critical moments. Moreover, gold and forex reserves are of course the base that could provide the necessary volume of imports if necessary. We still import many items," Nabiullina said.

"The gold and forex reserves could be used if required, as and when the need arises," Nabiullina said.

The United States EU, UK, Canada, Switzerland and Australia froze Central Bank of Russia assets in March due to events in Ukraine. Nabiullina said on Monday that the Central Bank currently had around half of its gold and forex reserves at its disposal. This is gold, yuan, and they do not give us the opportunity to manage the situation with the currency in the domestic market," she said. Finance Minister Anton Siluanov has said sanctions had deprived Russia of assess to $300 billion of its reserves.

Russia's international reserves were $609.4 billion on April 8. They included $481.4 billion in foreign currency and $131.5 billion gold. Gold accounted for 21.5% of the reserves at the end of 2021. Foreign currency reserves were invested in financial instruments more than anything else at 33.9% denominated in euros, roughly $208 billion in terms of dollars, and the share of assets in Chinese yuan was 17.1% at $105 billion, U.S. dollars was 10.9% at $67 billion, British pounds was 6.2% at $38 billion, Japanese yen was 5.9% at $36 billion, Canadian dollars was 3.2% at $20 billion, Australian dollars was 1% at $6 billion, and Singapore dollars was 0.3% at $2 billion.