May 5 (Reuters) - Russia's National Wealth Fund (NWF)
stood at the equivalent of $155.0 billion as of May 1, Russia's
finance ministry said on Friday, slightly up from $154.5 billion
on April 1.
The finance ministry said the sovereign wealth fund was
equivalent in value to 8.3% of Russia's gross domestic product
(GDP), up from 7.9% a month earlier.
The NWF is a rainy-day fund built up from years of profits
on oil and gas exports.
The finance ministry said it had spent 83.2 billion roubles
($1.09 billion) of yuan and gold from the NWF during April to
cover the government's budget deficit. It plans to spend 2.9
trillion roubles from the NWF this year.
The fund's liquid assets amounted to 6.83 trillion roubles,
or 4.6% of GDP, by early May, compared with 6.71 trillion
roubles, or 4.5% of GDP, a month earlier.
($1 = 76.5670 roubles)
(Reporting by Darya Korsunskaya; Writing by Alexander Marrow;
Editing by Conor Humphries)
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