Norway's central bank will sell foreign exchange equivalent of 900 million Norwegian crowns per day in February, compared with 500 million crowns during January, the bank said on Friday. The bank is selling the currency because the government's transfers to its $800-billion sovereign wealth fund have been smaller than earlier expected and the budget is spending more of its oil related income.
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.