Philippine foreign exchange reserves declined to 83.82 billion U.S. dollars in February from 85.27 billion U.S. dollars a month ago, the local central bank said Thursday.

The central bank attributed the decline to the national government's utilization of some funds to settle its external liabilities and the revaluation of currency and gold holdings.

But outflows were partially offset by inflows from the central bank's foreign exchange operations and income from investments abroad and the foreign currency deposits by the national government.

The country's gross international reserves in February can cover 12 months worth of imports of goods and payments of services and income. It was also equivalent to 10.5 times the country's short-term external debt based on original maturity and 6.6 times based on residual maturity. Endi

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