IMF chief economist says new SDR issue on 'menu of options' to aid member countries

The International Monetary Fund is looking at the potential for another allocation of Special Drawing Rights as an option to aid its members through difficulties with high food and energy prices prompted by the war in Ukraine and a slowing global economy, the fund's chief economist said on Tuesday.

IMF Economic Counsellor Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas said a new allocation of SDR monetary reserves, after a $650 billion allocation last year, is "part of a menu of options that the fund is exploring currently."

"There have been some calls by policymakers to maybe have another SDR allocation and this is something that the fund is certainly going to be looking at, but I don't think that this is certainly the only discussion that we're having on the issue of what the fund can do in the current environment," Gourinchas told a news conference on the IMF's latest economic forecasts.