Opportunity cost of Forex Reserves in India

"In the case of reserves: India holds roughly $200 billion of reserves, all of which are invested in low-yield first-world securities. From an `insurance' perspective, what India needs is roughly $50 billion. The opportunity cost of reduced returns works out to perhaps five percentage points. Applying 5 percentage points on $150 billion is an annual cost of $7.5 billion or roughly 1% of GDP."

- Ajay Shah