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BB on a dollar buying spree

Sajjadur Rahman
Bangladesh Bank is on a US dollar purchasing bout to thwart the currency's depreciation, which would affect remittance and export earnings.
As per Bangladesh Bank (BB) data, in just the 25 days of the new fiscal year, $519 million has been bought from banks, when only $157 million was purchased in the whole of fiscal 2011-12.
BB officials deem the operation imperative to keep the exchange rate stable.
“We are yet to sell a single US dollar so far this month. Rather, we are buying greenbacks to prevent its depreciation,” a senior BB official told The Daily Star yesterday.
In 2011, Bangladesh suffered its worst currency devaluation in history, when the taka devalued by around 15 percent, and consequently, import cost and inflation went high.
In practice, Bangladesh is on a managed floating regime, meaning the value of the taka is allowed to fluctuate from day-to-day, but the BB intervenes from time-to-time via buying or selling to influence its value.
The average price quoted in the interbank foreign exchange market for the
dollar yesterday was Tk 81.70, a fall by Tk 0.10 from last week.
“We'll continue our intervention in line with the market requirement,” said the BB official.
In recent months, rising remittances and a drop in imports have increased the flow of the dollar into the market, and
hence the need for intervention, the central bank said.
“Also, there was no payment for petroleum import in July so far,” said another BB official.
The dollar purchase is boosting the country's foreign exchange reserve, which stood at $10.3 billion yesterday, when in May 9 this year it was $9.58 billion.
“The cost of imports will go down as well,” added Monzur Hossain, senior research fellow of Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies.
But Hossain had a couple of questions: how much further would the dollar have slid had the BB not intervened, and is it the right rate for stabilisation?
Bankers said the move to depreciate the dollar may encourage remitters to go for informal channels other than banks to send their money home.
Also the reduced value of the dollar will shrink the earnings of the exporters, they said.
Treasury officials at different commercial banks, however, said had the BB not undertaken the operation now, the price of the dollar would have fallen well below Tk 80.
sajjad@thedailystar.net