Dhaka, Bangladesh (BBN)– The central bank of Bangladesh has sold US$20 million more to three commercial banks to meet the growing demand for the greenback in the market.
“We’ve sold the foreign currency at market rate to the banks on Wednesday to settle outstanding letters of credit (LCs) against imports particularly fuel oil, food grains and capital machinery,” a senior official of the Bangladesh Bank (BB) told BBN in Dhaka.
The US dollar was quoted at BDT 82.70 in the inter-bank foreign exchange market on the day unchanged from the previous working day.
The central banker also said the BB wants to minimise the mismatch between demand and supply of foreign exchange in the market through providing such support to the banks.
“Such liquidity support will continue in line with the market requirement,” the BB official said, adding that the central bank is monitoring the overall foreign exchange (forex) market situation closely.
The central bank has resumed providing the foreign exchange support in the recent months through selling of the US currency to the banks directly to keep the market stable.
A total of $952 million was sold since July 01 of this fiscal year, 2017-18, to the commercial banks as part of its ongoing support, the BB latest data showed.
The market operators said the demand for the US dollar is gradually increasing, mainly due to higher import payments pressure, particularly of capital machinery, petroleum products and consumer items including food grains.
BBN/SSR/AD