World Bank Finances

Financial policies

Loans

Liquid asset management

Borrowings & liability

Capital

IDA finances

· net income of $1,285 million;

· loan disbursements to member countries of $13,998 million;

· medium- and long-term borrowing the equivalent of $15.1 billion in eighteen currencies;

· average medium- to long-term borrowing costs, after swaps, of 5.01 percent;

· financial returns on the investment portfolio of 5 percent;

· a healthy reserves-to-loan ratio of 14 percent.

The Board of Governors agreed at the October 1996 Annual Meeting to allocate net income earned during fiscal 1996 as follows:

· $250 million to the general reserves to maintain the reserves-to-loan ratio and to prefund partial waivers of interest charges;

· $300 million equivalent in SDRs as of June 30, 1996, as an immediate grant to IDA;

· the remainder, $637 million, to surplus.

The Board of Governors also authorized the following transfers from the IBRD surplus:

· $300 million equivalent in SDRs as of June 30, 1996, as an immediate grant to IDA;

· $500 million by way of a grant to the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPCs) Debt Initiative Trust Fund in support of the HIPC debt initiative.