SAMA assets surge 6% to SR 2.57 trillion

Reserve assets of Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency (SAMA) increased by 16 percent in May to SR 2.57 trillion, the highest in its record for three consecutive months, according to Al-Eqtisadiah newspaper.
Saudi assets valued SR 2.22 trillion for the same period last year, with an increase of one percent compared with April the same year, thus recording a value of SR 2.54 trillion in reserves.
SAMA's total assets include outside foreign investments in financial instruments, foreign currencies and deposits abroad, reserves at the International Monetary Fund, the special drawing rights and of course, gold.
The growth is due to the increase by 25 percent in investments in financial instruments abroad, SR 1.86 trillion against SR 1.49 trillion for the same period last year, thus contributing with an increase of 10.6 percent of the growth in reserves.
However, the other items of assets reserves dropped with varied percentages. The special drawing rights fell by five percent to SR 35.2 billion against SR 37.1 billion for the same period last year.
As well, reserves at IMF dropped by four percent, recording SR 19.3 billion against SR 20 billion last year. Foreign currencies and deposits abroad recorded also a decrease of 3 percent, to SR 652 billion compared to SR 671.9 billion in May 2012.
Meanwhile, profits of Saudi commercial banks increased also by 10.7 percent in May to SR 3.2 billion, compared with SR 2.9 billion for the same period last year. The same increases in profit levels were realized in April as well.
Accumulative profits of banks in the first five months this year amounted to SR 15.67 billion, against SR 15.44 billion for the same period last year. The same results apply to the month of April, with accumulative profits for the last five months increased by 25.9 percent against SR 12.44 billion at the end of April last year.