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Dollar turns scarce as import booms

Staff Correspondent
A decelerating export growth, payment of deferred import bills as well as for fuel and fertiliser imports, and additional expenses for hajj pilgrims have resulted in a fierccdollar crisis.
Consequently, taka is losing value against the US dollar every day. The crisis has to do more with the scarcity than the high price of dollar. The daily cross-currency transaction volume in the interbank foreign exchange market has nose-dived from around $2 crore in early November to the range of$14 to$151akhnow.
The situation has worsened to such an extent that no dollar seller was found in the forex market last
Tuesday.
That day, in a bid to keep dollar price at the import level in check, Bangladesh Foreign Exchange Dealers Association (BFEDA) in a meeting fixed it al Tk 67. But the step proved ineffective, as, according to banking sources, the price of dollar in the last two days hovered overTk68.
The price level of dollar for import has climbed steadily from below Tk 66 in October to Tk 67 in lastweektohitTk 68.15yesterday.
In the inter-bank forex market, the dollar price soared from Tk 65.80in early November to Tk 66.10 last week and then rose by Tk 0.10 yesterday to Tk 66.20, banking sources said.
The state-owned Sonali Bank
and Agrani Bank have been the key players in the inter-bank forex market. But the dollar scarcity has become so acute that Agrani Bank is now the only one selling dollar and that too in a limited amount. It sold only $2 lakh yesterday.
For the last few weeks, Sonali Bankhas not supplied any dollar to the market. It rather had to buy dollar in large volumes. Even yesterday it purchased $1 lakh from Agrani Bank.
A number of factors are behind the Sonali Bank's forex debacle. This month it had to pay S4.5 crore for the fuel imported by the state petroleum agency, Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC), alone. The bank is also due to pay
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some more import bills of the BPC to the tune of $1 crore very shortly.
Besides, this month Sonali Bank had to make a part payment of a $2.2 crore bill for import of fertiliser by the government and will have to pay the rest soon. The bank is also due to pay another $3 crore on December 19 for the aircraft hired to carry hajj pilgrims.
A few months back, the banks in the country deferred some import bills on advice of the central bank in the face of a huge leap in import volume. They now have to pay those dues. As a result, some private banks that used to sell dollars previously are now forced to stop supplying dollar to the inter-bank forex market.
Facing a shrinking forex reserve, Bangladesh Bank has also stopped supplying dollar to the market. The reserve which was over $300 crore in June stood at $241 crore on Wednesday.
A widening trade gap created by accelerating import growth and decelerating growth of export has also contributed to the deepening dollar crisis. In July-August, import grew by 16 percent and export by only 3.4 percent.
Again, over the last few days, a number of large letters of credit have been opened for import in the telecom and power sectors. And, with the year-end approaching, the multinational companies are sending their profit home. These are also contributing to the dollar shortage, foreign bank sources said.