Where Indian money is going, and what the central bank is doing about the rupee. Page built 27 Oct 2026, 14:53 IST · Official RBI/Govt published · Live market feed · Estimate model · Manual manual seed
1Reserves now
Last updated 27 Oct 2026, 11:34 IST · week ended 16 Oct 2026 · RBI Weekly Statistical Supplement (prid 63855)
Reserve Status Official
Total FX reservesOfficial
$721.02bn
−$5.01bn on week
vs peakOfficial
−$64.69bn
Peak $785.71bn on 4 Sept 2026 (-8.2%)
Foreign currency assetsOfficial
$591.85bn
−$5.76bn
GoldOfficial
$105.80bn
+$0.71bn
SDRsOfficial
$18.58bn
+$0.030bn
Reserve position in IMFOfficial
$4.79bn
+$0.011bn
Prior week totalOfficial
$726.03bn
week ended 9 Oct 2026
52-week changeOfficial
+$18.74bn
vs same week last year
Reserve Health Estimate
Last updated 27 Oct 2026, 11:34 IST · derived from RBI reserves ÷ manual imports
11.2 months of import cover
Safe
Defence: ActiveEstimate
Reserves falling ~$11.2bn/week + forward short up $63bn to $200bn + 9 confirmed RBI actions in 30 days
-8.2% from peak · 30 weeks of runway to 6-month floor at last 4-wk avg burn ($11.2bn/wk)
■ Risky < 6 mo■ Warning 6–9 mo■ Safe ≥ 9 mo Based on India's yearly import bill of $775bn (Apr 2025–Mar 2026), about $64.6bn a month. Manual
2RBI defence spend
Last updated 27 Oct 2026, 11:34 IST (reserves) · cross rates 27 Oct 2026, 11:35 IST · Bulletin 26 Oct 2026, 10:13 IST
Reserve change: weekOfficial
−$5.01bn
Est. intervention −$4.98bnEstimate
Reserve change: 4 weeks (month)Official
−$44.88bn
Est. intervention −$36.22bnEstimate
Reserve change: 52 weeks (year)Official
+$18.74bn
Est. intervention +$24.59bnEstimate
Is RBI buying or selling dollars? Official
In August 2026, RBI bought $43.3bn and added to reserves
Last 12 months: sold $64.3bn, bought $72.4bn.
Bought (saving)Sold (spending to protect the rupee)
Each bar is one month of RBI's dollar trading in the market. RBI publishes these numbers about 2 months late, so the latest month shown is August 2026. Source: RBI Bulletin.
How many dollars are really free? Official
Free $521bn
$200bn
Free to use: $521.0bnEstimateAlready promised: $200.1bn (end-August 2026) OfficialTotal reserves: $721.02bn (week ended 16 Oct 2026) Official
RBI has agreed to sell these dollars at future dates, so they're not really free to spend. "Promised" is RBI's net forward sales book for end-August 2026, from the RBI Bulletin (RBI Bulletin October 2026 table 4 (PDF)). The two dates differ slightly.
3RBI actions & events timeline
Upcoming first, then newest past event. Dates in IST · curated from RBI releases and news; auto = picked up from RBI's press-release feed, not yet reviewed.
Upcoming · in 3 daysData
Next weekly forex reserves release (WSS)
RBI publishes reserves for the previous week every Friday (~5 pm IST); a big drop usually means heavy dollar selling.
Next repo-rate call after October's hike. Another hike would add support for the rupee; a pause would signal RBI thinks October's tightening is enough.
RBI rejects all bids at T-bill auction (91/182/364-day)
RBI rejected all bids at the T-bill auction, accepting nothing against the ₹23,000 crore it planned to borrow, refusing to let short-term borrowing costs rise.
RBI has sold dollars for future delivery (forwards and swaps). These are the net amounts it must deliver, by when they fall due.
Due within 1 month
$0.0bn
Due within 3 months
$0.0bn
Due within 12 months
$23.5bn
These promises could take reserves from 11.2 to about 10.8 months of import cover.
Official (RBI) Net forward short $200.1bn as of 31 Aug 2026 ($23.5bn due within a year, $176.6bn later) · RBI Bulletin October 2026 table 4A (PDF) · fetched 26 Oct 2026, 10:13 IST
Assumes RBI pays these from reserves and does not roll them over; reserves $721.02bn (week ended 16 Oct 2026), imports $774.98bn/yr. Colours follow the Reserve Health gauge: red below 6 months, yellow 6–9, green 9+.
5Time to ₹100
Last updated 27 Oct 2026, 14:45 IST · from today's rate ₹95.12 per dollar (27 Oct 2026, 14:45 IST)
If things stay as they are, ₹100 around Dec 2027Estimate
Assumes RBI keeps selling dollars at its recent pace ($11.2bn a week) until reserves reach a safe floor, and oil stays at the price below. Then the rupee falls faster.
What if oil gets cheaper or pricier?
Live Brent today $110.91 (opened $110.28, previous close $115.81) · Yahoo Finance BZ=F (ICE Brent front-month futures) · as of 27 Oct 2026, 14:35 IST
Official Reality check: currency traders' prices point to Jan 2028 (Official (FBIL), as of 19 Oct 2026). Close to our estimate.
How we estimate this
Headline: stance Active at $11.2bn/week of reserve drain. Runway to a 6-month import-cover floor ($387bn): 6.8 mo. Drift while defending 2.77%/yr, after the floor 6.14%/yr (exact date 13 Dec 2027).
Drift while defending = base drift + k × (Moderate reference $7bn/wk − current pace). Once reserves reach the floor, defence stops and drift rises to base + k × Moderate pace. k = 0.3pp is an illustrative assumption, not estimated from data.
Oil: India imports about 1.6-1.8bn barrels a year, so each $10/bbl changes the import bill by about $12.5bn a year (range $12-15bn). We assume RBI covers 50% of the change from reserves and the rest weakens the rupee via k. No published estimate of rupee drift per dollar of oil was found, so this share is an assumption.
Reality check: solves spot × (1 + p(t) × t) = 100 on the 1–12 month forward premium curve (Official (FBIL): 1M 6.99%, 12M 4.12% a year, as of 19 Oct 2026; flat beyond 1 year; exact date 25 Jan 2028). Forward premia mostly reflect the interest-rate gap between India and the US, so they are a hedging cost, not a forecast. FBIL USD/INR Forward Premia
Model, not advice: mechanical extrapolations under stated assumptions, not predictions. Brent and forward premia are fetched daily; the last good value is kept on failure.