The International Role of the U.S. Dollar – 2025 Edition

A key function of a currency is as a store of value which can be saved and retrieved in the future without a significant loss of purchasing power. One measure of confidence in a currency as a store of value is its usage in official foreign exchange reserves. As shown in Figure 2, the U.S. dollar comprised 58 percent of disclosed global official foreign reserves in 2024 and far surpassed all other currencies including the euro (20 percent), Japanese yen (6 percent), British pound (5 percent), and the Chinese renminbi (2 percent). The dollar share has declined from its peak of 72 percent of reserves in 2001, as foreign reserve managers have added to their portfolios a wide range of smaller currencies, including the Australian and Canadian dollars (IMF COFER). Even with this decline, the dollar remains by far the dominant reserve currency and only returned to about the share it had in 1995. Notably, it is basically unchanged since 2022, when it accounted for 58 percent of reserves, suggesting that U.S. sanctions on Russia following the invasion of Ukraine have not led to fears of dollar "weaponization" causing a notable reallocation of reserves out of dollars.