Bangladesh's external account looks stable with gross foreign-exchange reserves standing above US $34 billion despite deferred import payment through the Asian Clearing Unit (ACU), official statistics show.
The government cleared payments worth $1.51 billion against imports made in March-April period of 2026.
After the payment, the country's gross forex reserves came down to $34.14 billion Sunday from $35.62 billion of previous working day.
As per the International Monetary Fund (IMF)'s Balance of Payments International Investment Poisson Manual-six edition, generally known as BMP6, the reserves fell to $29.48 billion during the period under review from $30.96 billion, according to the central bank's latest data.
"Our forex reserves remain at a satisfactory level even after making the routine payment to the ACU," a senior official of Bangladesh Bank (BB) told The Financial Express (FE) in response to a query.
He also says Bangladesh is now capable of meeting more than five months' import-payment obligations with its existing reserves.
"Higher remittance inflows and lower import-payment obligations have contributed to an improvement in the country's reserve position," the central banker explains.
The purchasing of the US dollar from the commercial banks by the central bank has also helped push up the forex reserves recently, according to the central banker.
The central bank of Bangladesh has so far bought $5.75 billion from banks directly since July 13 last under the prevailing free-floating exchange-rate arrangement, the BB data show.
"We're now giving priority to keeping the exchange of the US dollar against the local currency stable despite ongoing geopolitical tensions," the central banker says in response to another query.
The central banker also says the gross forex reserves may cross $36 billion by the end of June if the government secures minimum $2.0 billion in loans from overseas sources.
Meanwhile, the amount of ACU payments rose to $1.51 billion during the period under review from $1.37 billion earlier mainly due to higher imports from the ACU-member countries, particularly from India.
Bangladesh is now importing different consumer items, cotton, raw materials and capital machinery from the ACU countries, especially from neighbouring India, according to the central bankers.
As per the existing provisions, outstanding import bills and interest thereof are to be paid by member-countries at the end of every two months.
The ACU is an arrangement involving Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Iran, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and the Maldives through which intraregional transactions among the participating central banks are settled on a multilateral basis.
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