(3 October 2007 – Australia) The Australian foreign exchange market is the fastest growing market in Asia, the Reserve Bank of Australia has found.The survey, conducted in April 2007, found that the Australian FX market is also the seventh largest in the world in terms of global turnover.
The RBA said that activity in Australia’s foreign exchange and derivatives market has continued to increase rapidly in the three years since the last survey.
Turnover has more than doubled and has increased across all instruments, counterparties and currencies, the report found.
The survey found that foreign exchange turnover in Australia increased from an average of US$81 billion in April 2004 to US$170 billion in April 2007-10-03
This includes transactions in spot, outright foreign exchange forwards and foreign exchange swaps, of which the latter accounts for 65 percent of the market.
The report also found that the Australia Dollar/America Dollar currency pair is the fourth most traded in the world, while the Australian Dollar is the sixth most traded currency globally.
The findings are part of a survey of 54 countries conducted by the Bank for International Settlements and also included the over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives market.