Dhaka, Bangladesh (BBN)- The central bank of Bangladesh has resumed its foreign-exchange support through selling the US dollar to the commercial banks after nearly two years and a half to keep the market stable, officials said.
As part of the intervention, the Bangladesh Bank (BB) sold US$45 million at market rate to five commercial banks directly on Monday to meet the growing demand for the greenback.
The banks are Standard Chartered Bank (SCB), Rupali Bank Limited, Southeast Bank Limited, AB Bank Limited and Prime Bank Limited, according to the BB officials.
The central bank earlier sold $10 million to a state-owned commercial bank directly on June 20, 2012, they added.
“The central bank has sold the US dollars to the banks for making their import payments for petroleum products, fertilisers, sugar and edible oils,” a BB senior official told BBN in Dhaka.
The BB’s latest move came against the backdrop of depreciating trend of the Bangladesh Taka (BDT) against the US dollar in recent days.
The BDT has depreciated by 0.26 per cent against the dollar in the last two weeks, following an increased demand for the greenback to settle import payments by the commercial banks.
According to the market operators, the US dollar was quoted at BDT 77.62-BDT 77.63 on the inter-bank foreign-exchange market on the day against BDT 77.40-BDT 77.44 on November 10 last.
Besides, the rate of greenback for BC (bills for collection) selling reached maximum BDT 79.20 on Monday from Tk 78.00 on November 11 this year.
“The rate of the US dollar for BC selling at customer level increased significantly during the period under review to settle the import payments,” a senior treasury official of a commercial bank said. “The exchange rate of the US dollar for BC selling may ease in the coming days if the central bank injects foreign exchange in line with the market requirement.”
BBN/SSR/AD-24Nov14-11:50 pm (BST)