US$320bn boost for IMF

"I have been informed today by the Swiss authorities of their intention to provide a substantial amount of additional financing commitments to the IMF," Lagarde said in a statement on Wednesday, 18 April 2012.

"I also received today firm indications of support from several other countries which, together with Switzerland's contribution, will amount to over $26 billion. These countries will formalise their individual commitments in the coming days," she added.

"This brings to about $320 billion dollars the commitments received so far."

The financial pledges from Switzerland and other countries are in addition to previous pledges for increased contributions from the euro area, Japan, Sweden, Norway, Poland and Denmark.

Lagarde said on Wednesday night at an event of Bertelsmann Foundation that the world economic outlook was "slightly improved", yet still fragile and "extremely unstable".

She said the IMF was about stability but there was a "big shortfall of stability at the moment".

Boosting the IMF's resources is likely to dominate discussions on the Spring Meetings of the IMF and the World Bank, which will officially start on 20 April in Washington.