East Timor's Oil Fund grew by US$720.94 million in the fourth quarter of 2012 and ended the year with a total value of US$11.777 billion, said the East Timor Central Bank.

The report on the last three months of 2012, available on the East Timor Central Bank's website and dated 12 February, said that the "capital of the fund increased from US$11.054 billion to US$11.777 billion."

Capital added to the fund from taxes, royalties and other revenue totalled US$1.234 billion and a total of US$590.4 million had been taken out of the fund.

Around US$586 million was used to fund the State Budget, and the remaining US$3.5 million were used to pay the fund's management fees.

The Oil Fund Law was outlined in 2005 in order to contribute to the effective management of Eat Timor's oil resources. The fund is managed by the East Timor Central Bank and the Finance Ministry.

In August 2011 the country's parliament approved a change in the law in order to make it easier to diversify its investment portfolio, which until that point had focused exclusively on US Treasury Bonds, as a way of increasing the return on investments. (macauhub)