Central Bank of China

PRESS RELEASE Release Date: Mar. 7, 2003




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Trading in the Taipei Foreign Exchange Market in Jan. 2003

The trading in the Taipei foreign exchange market includes all foreign exchange transactions made by authorized foreign exchange banks and offshore banking units. After deducting double counting on the part of interbank transactions, total net trading volume in the market amounted to US$132.8 billion in Jan. 2003. The average daily turnover was US$6.3 billion (Table 1).

In terms of trading partners, transactions between banks and customers accounted for 34.4 percent of total net turnover, with interbank transactions making up the remaining 65.6 percent (Graph 1).

In terms of traded currencies, NT dollar trading against foreign currencies accounted for 52.1 percent of total trading volume, of which the share of NT dollars against US dollars was 49.3 percent (Graph 2).

With respect to types of transactions, spot transactions accounted for the lion's share with 59.9 percent of total turnover, followed by foreign exchange swaps with 17.0 percent, Options with 11.9 percent (Graph 3).

In terms of the way transactions were made, the direct trade accounted for 70.7 percent of the interbank foreign exchange transactions, through money brokers for the remaining 29.3 percent (Graph 4).

In addition to the above-mentioned foreign exchange transactions, there are some other derivatives offered by the authorized foreign exchange banks. The turnover of interest rate swaps, forward rate agreements were US$1,839.8million and US$738 million, respectively (Table 2).

Graph & Table [EXCEL][PDF]