Dhaka, Bangladesh (BBN) – The Bangladesh Bank (BB) sold US$12 million at market rate to the state-owned Sonali Bank Limited directly on Monday to meet the growing demand for the greenback.
“The central bank has provided the foreign currency support to the state-owned commercial SCB to settle outstanding letters of credit (LCs) against imports of fuel oil,” a senior BB official told BBN in Dhaka, adding that such operation will continue in line with the market requirement.
The US dollar was quoted at BDT 80.78-BDT 80.84 in the inter-bank foreign exchange market on the day against BDT 80.65-BDT 80.73 of the previous working day, the BB data showed.
The country’s foreign exchange reserve stood at $9.35 billion on Monday after the sale of $12 million by the central bank to the SCB, the central banker added.
The central bank has so far pumped in $636 million directly to the commercial banks to meet the increasing demand for the greenback in the current fiscal year, according to the central bank statistics.
BBN/SSR/AD-20Dec11-7:23 am (BST)
