June remittance rises to $2.2b

FE REPORT | July 03, 2023 00:00:00

Foreign-exchange inflows from expatriate Bangladeshis through formal channel amounted to about US$2.2 billion in June, as per official data, in a rise on the back of a festival binge.

The remittance amount in a single month, ahead of the Eid-ul-Azha, is the highest in 35 months.

Higher remittance receipt is a priority task of the government for repletion of the country's stressed foreign-exchange reserves that hover around $30 billion by official count.

Bangladesh received a total of $21.6 billion in the immediate-past fiscal year, 2022-23, up 2.8 per cent from the previous fiscal year's receipt.

Most of the remittances came through private commercial banks. They brought a total of $1.7 billion while the state-owned commercial banks including specialised ones brought $446 million.

Islami Bank Bangladesh has the highest share in the foreign-exchange cake as it handled $401 million singly, accounting for more than one-fifth of the total receipts.

The second-highest amount netted among the private commercial banks is by Premier Bank--more than $134 million.

Of the state-owned banks, Agrani Bank bags the biggest chunk of the hard-earned foreign exchanges-- more than $132 million

Earlier in May, remittance inflows were $ 1.7 billion, down by 10.3 per cent from its corresponding month a year earlier.

In the past FY23, there were two more months which had on average $2.0 billion each --- July and August.

On May 31, the Association of Bankers Bangladesh (ABB) and the Bangladesh Foreign Exchange Dealers' Association (Bafeda) came up with a decision that banks can pay a maximum rate of Tk108.50 against the remittance dollar.

The dollar rates for remittance and export proceeds were increased on April 30 by Tk1.0 to Tk108 and Tk106 respectively.

However, expatriates mostly send foreign exchanges from the KSA or Saudi Arabia followed by the USA.

During 11 months from July to May, the Bangladeshi expatriates sent worth $3.4 billion from the KSA and $3.3 billion from the USA, respectively.

jaimharoon@yahoo.com