The country’s foreign exchange reserves crossed $24-billion mark for the first time on Wednesday as the Bangladesh Bank’s purchasing of US dollars from the local banks surpassed $2.80 billion in this financial year amid slow business.
A BB official said that the reserves stood at $24.02 billion on Wednesday as the BB kept intervening into the forex market so that the taka remained stable against the dollar amid lack of demand for greenbacks.
‘The reserves increased further because of slide in import payments in last three months as business activities in the country remained dull because of political unrest and uncertainty,’ said the official.
He said that the relatively good inflow of remittance and static growth in export earnings amid the dull import helped the rise in the reserves.
Earlier on February 26 the reserves hit $23-billion mark but it came down slightly because of import payments before climbing to $23 billion again in March.
Officials said that BB purchased around $50 million from the local banks, taking the total dollar buying to $2.83 billion in July-April.
‘The demand for dollars declined again in last few weeks. The demand for dollars had picked up in November-December in the current fiscal year but started to slide since the opposition-led political movement began in January,’ said another BB official.
He said that the BB had to purchase dollars to halt the slide of the greenbacks against the taka.
Former interim government finance adviser Mirza Azizul Islam earlier told New Age that ‘big-but-idle’ foreign exchange reserves would not put any positive impact on the economy.
The central bank is continuously purchasing greenbacks from the banks as they are enjoying greenbacks availability amid lower import financing due to political unrest, he said.
The inward remittance also maintained a downward trend, so the reserves maintained a rising tendency due to an inefficiency of the central bank in using the dollars, he said.
The BB purchased around $9 billion greenbacks from the local banks to keep the taka stable against the dollar, he said.
‘Higher foreign exchange reserves are good for economy when the greenbacks come from the earnings of export and inward remittance,’ he said.
The US dollar was quoted at Tk 77.80 in the inter-bank forex market in last few months in 2015 due to the central bank’s repeated intervention into the foreign exchange market.
The BB data showed that the central bank had purchased $5.15 billion in the FY 2013-14 and $4.53 billion in the FY13 from the scheduled banks which were grappling with the dollars because of lack of demand.
The reserves crossed $15-billion mark on May 7, 2013, $16-billion mark on August 13, $17-billion mark on October 22, $18-billion mark on December 19, $19-billion mark on February 19, 2014 and $20-billion mark on April 10, $21-billion mark on June 16 and $22-billion mark on August 7, 2014.
Source: New Age
