Saudi Arabia’s public reserves rose to SR904.6 billion by the end of October 2014 compared to SR801.8 billion in the previous month, showing 13 percent increase or SR103 billion in a single month.

The increase is significant as it occurred despite the continuous fall in oil prices during the past three months as prices plunged from $115 to nearly $70.

Reserves deposited at the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency (SAMA) reached SR180 billion during the year, with an increase of 25 percent as the amount was SR724.6 billion by the end of October 2013.

The government had withdrawn SR4.5 billion from budget allocations for projects deposited with SAMA bringing down the total allocations from SR519.3 billion to SR513.8 billion by the end of October 2013. The Kingdom’s public reserves experienced big jump when the government transferred SR103 billion to the reserves category, Al-Eqtisadiah business daily reported.

Saudi Arabia’s public reserves increased as a result of accumulating budget surpluses over the past five years. This year, the Kingdom is expected to make a total revenue of SR1.1 trillion and a surplus of SR147 billion over the projected SR855 billion budget.

The expected surplus is based on the average price of oil at $90 per barrel for the remaining period of the year compared to the average price of Brent oil at $105 during the last nine months of the current year.

Saudi daily oil exports averaged 6.73 million barrels compared to local daily consumption of nearly 2.3 million barrels, the business daily said.

Normally Saudi crude oil is sold at prices less than Brent prices by nearly $4 and, therefore, the price of Saudi crude oil averaged $101 during the last nine months.

Oil revenues normally comprise nearly 90 percent of the Saudi budget while the remaining 10 percent are coming from nonoil sources, the report said.

Saudi oil revenues are expected to reach SR780 billion ($208 billion) in the first nine months of the current year while the remaining three months are expected to fetch SR221.5 billion ($59 billion), the report said.