India FCNR(B) Inflows 2026: Half the Money in the Last Ten Days

The Reserve Bank of India opened its special USD–INR swap facility for fresh three-to-five-year FCNR(B) deposits on 8 June 2026, after the rupee fell in the oil shock that followed the February conflict in the Gulf. The facility was to run to 30 September. On 14 August the RBI reported USD 52.3 billion in deposits and announced the window would shut on 31 August instead. A week later the total was USD 65.4 billion. At close it was about USD 127.2 billion — plus about USD 9.2 billion of bank and corporate foreign-currency borrowings, for about USD 136.4 billion in all. (Reports of the closing figures differ in the second decimal place; they are rounded here.)

The last ten days therefore account for USD 61.8 billion, or 49 percent of the entire FCNR(B) haul. A late surge of that size is consistent with leveraged trades rather than steady household saving — offshore banking units at GIFT City were offering depositors up to nineteen times leverage against their FCNR(B) deposits, and India’s international financial centre later reported that its banking units had facilitated about USD 52.8 billion, roughly 42 percent of the total. The timing alone does not show who placed the money; GIFT City’s share is not in itself the leveraged share.

Only the three RBI-reported readings are plotted. The curve between them is unknown and not interpolated.

Why the chart is on a Bhutan site: the ngultrum is pegged to the rupee, so this defence of the rupee is Bhutan’s exchange rate too — and Bhutan ran a very different diaspora fundraising the year before. The two instruments are set side by side in Gelephu Bond vs India’s FCNR(B) Window.