The Monetary Authority of Macao announced today that the preliminary estimate of Macao SAR’s foreign exchange reserves amounted to MOP161.6 billion (USD20.05 billion) at the end of February 2018. The reserves decreased by 1.0% from the revised value of MOP163.2 billion (USD20.26 billion) for the previous month. Macao SAR’s foreign exchange reserves at end-February 2018 represented 11 times the currency in circulation or 85.7% of pataca M2 at end-January 2018.
The trade-weighted effective exchange rate index for the pataca dropped 1.31 points month-to-month and 8.25 points year-on-year to 100.7 in February 2018, implying that overall speaking, the exchange rate of the pataca declined against the currencies of Macao’s major trading partners.