Some countries have expressed interest in buying bonds of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the institution's managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said on Saturday.

"It is interesting for many countries, so we just passed the template of the standard form of the agreement," Strauss-Kahn told a press briefing at the IMF and World Bank spring meetings.

"I'm sure that this vehicle will be used, provides flexibility," he said.

He said the board of the IMF was discussing with the different creditors many issues, including the way to implement the bond, the amount of money to be put in, among others.

According to sources close to the matter, the bonds would probably be denominated in an IMF quasi-currency called special drawing rights (SDRs), which the IMF created in 1969 as a way to support its 185 member states. They are allocated according to members' quotas.

The IMF has been working on a bond offering since at least January as a way to increase the amount of money it has to lend to struggling nations.

In March, the IMF proposed to issue the bonds for the first time in its history, as a way for countries to increase the Fund's resources and to minimize foreign exchange risks.

Brazilian Finance Minister Guido Mantega said officials from Brazil, China, Russia and India, the so-called BRIC countries, met Friday in Washington to reach a common position on terms they want to see in such a bond.

(Xinhua News Agency April 26, 2009)