ECONOMIC

facility is designed to help countries overcome shortfalls in export earningswhich are largely beyond their own control. During 1976 drawings approvedunder this facility amounted to SDR 2.3 billion compared with a total usagefor the preceding 13-year period, 1963-75, of SDR 1.2 billion. The moreliberal access to the Compensatory Financing Facility has clearly done muchto ease external financial constraints and cyclical payments problems thatnon-oil primary producing countries, both developed and developing, wereexperiencing during the year. In fact, the non-oil LDCs as a group were ableto increase their reserve positions by SDR 7^4 billion during the first 10months of 1976. However, this aggregate increase combines a number ofcountries that experienced increasing external financing problems withothers that experienced an easing of financial constraints.Finally, official financing resources available to developing countries arebeing augmented by the disposal of part of the IMF's gold holdings. Onesixth(25 million ounces) of the IMF's 150 million ounces of gold is beingsold at public auction over a 4-year period for the benefit of developingcountries. A portion of the profits are being transferred directly to developingcountries in proportion to their quotas in the IMF. The remainder ofthe profits is being used to finance a Trust Fund, separate from the IMF butmanaged by the IMF as trustee. This Trust Fund will provide balance ofpayments support on concessional terms to the IMF's poorest members. Anadditional 25 million ounces of the IMF's gold holdings are being sold to allmembers in proportion to their quotas, or "restituted," at the present officialprice of gold in exchange for currency usable by the IMF. Restitution isbeing carried out in four annual installments of approximately 6% millionounces each.In May of last year the IMF announced a program of 16 auctions atroughly 6-week intervals over a 2-year period covering sales of 12 5/2 millionounces of gold, with 780,000 ounces to be offered for sale at each auction.Five auctions were conducted under this program during 1976, in which atotal of 3.9 million ounces of gold was sold at an average price of $122 perounce and at a profit for the Trust Fund of $320 million. The first loansunder the Trust Fund program were being approved by the Executive Boardof the IMF at the turn of the year.In late 1976 the Executive Board of the IMF reviewed the results of theauction program and decided that it would be desirable—without disturbingany of the basic tenets of the general agreement on gold—to shift to a definiteschedule involving somewhat more frequent auctions at which slightlysmaller amounts of gold would be sold. The first installment of restitutionwas to take place in the first weeks of January 1977, to be followed on January26 by the last auction to be held at the 6-week intervals established inMay of last year. Beginning March 2, 1977, auctions will be conducted onthe first Wednesday of each month, each involving the sale of 525,000ounces.13.1