Database 5: The COFER database

IMF: Currency Composition of Official Foreign Exchange Reserves (COFER) is an IMF database that keeps end-of-period quarterly data on the currency composition of official exchange reserves. It was launched in 2005 by the IMF. The currency identified in COFER are: US dollar, Euro, Pound Sterling, Japanese yen, Swiss francs and other currencies.

In addition to the lines for the five major currencies and other currencies, there are two other lines in the tables: the unallocated reserves and allocated reserves.

The Unallocated Reserves line captures the difference between the total reserves data reported to IFS (for the world table on Foreign Exchange) and to COFER, for each of the country groupings mentioned above. It consists of two components:

• The total reserves of nonreporting countries, i.e., the countries within each grouping, which do not report currency composition data to COFER, and any discrepancy between reporters’ data on total reserves as reported to COFER and to IFS.
• The Allocated Reserves line equals the reporters’ data on total reserves as reported to COFER.
  

In addtion to it, the country samples are divided into advanced economies and emerging and developing economies. Hier is the list of the two country groups.