TOKYO (Agencies) —In the latest sign Japan is moving to actively deploy its massive stockpile of foreign-currency reserves outside the country, the Ministry of Finance announced Friday it will earmark $3.9 billion for strategic investments overseas through a government-affiliated financing body.

The funds will be used to finance Japanese companies' infrastructure projects and acquisitions abroad through a government-affiliated lender, the ministry said. The funds are part of Japan's $1.1 trillion foreign-exchange reserves, most of which is invested in U.S. Treasurys and other low-yield securities.
Japan has only recently started to make strategic investments outside the country using its currency reserves, a move that positions the state-owned Japan Bank for International Cooperation to act more like the sovereign-wealth funds of other nations.
Friday's announcement came as a reminder that even though the Japanese government has a massive fiscal debt load, which prompted the ratings agency Standard & Poor's to downgrade its credit Thursday, Tokyo has also amassed a giant pool of reserves from past currency-market interventions.