Srilanka, Sept. 11 -- Sri Lanka's Central Bank Governor Dr. Nandalal Weerasinghe used the inaugural Reserve Management Conference in Colombo on 10 September to deliver a pointed message to central bankers from across Asia and beyond: the world reserve managers once knew no longer exists, and the old playbook needs rewriting.
Addressing delegates at the opening of the two-day conference, themed "Building Buffers: Strategies for Reserve Management Amidst Heightened Uncertainties," Weerasinghe argued that foreign reserves have shifted from being a technical balance-sheet item to a country's frontline defence against a world defined by geopolitical fragmentation, sanctions, volatile capital flows and rapid technological change. Reserves, he sa...