Norway to sell NOK 700 million of FX per day

Norway's central bank will sell foreign exchange equivalent of 700 million Norwegian crowns ($94 million) per day in May, unchanged from April, the bank said on Thursday on its page. The bank is selling the currency because the government's transfers to its $900 billion sovereign wealth fund have been smaller than earlier expected and the budget is spending more of its oil related income.
Data out on Wednesday show that the government transferred just 5 billion crowns into the fund in the first quarter so most of the dollar-based income it received from its direct stakes in oil producing assets were converted into crowns. The bank usually puts foreign currency to be given to the fund into a "buffer portfolio", which had become bigger than necessary and has said it would gradually reduce the size of this buffer this year by selling foreign exchange in the market. The bank made its first purchase of crowns in October to cover the government's non-oil-related budget deficit.