Call money rate slightly upward

FE Report The inter-bank call money rate moved up further Tuesday, as withdrawal of cash from the banks gathered pace ahead of the Eid-ul-Azha festival, treasury officials said. "The call money rate moved up slightly on the day despite the central bank's injection of fresh fund into the market to keep it stable," a senior treasury official of a commercial bank told the FE. He also said the upward trend of call money may continue until Thursday, the last working day before the Eid festival, to meet the growing demand for cash of the banks' clients. The call rate ranged between 10.00 per cent and 19.00 per cent Tuesday against the previous range between 10.00 per cent and 15 per cent. However, most of the deals were settled at rates varying between 16.00 per cent and 17.00 per cent, the market operators said. Commercial banks and non-banking financial institutions (NBFIs) traded worth Tk 47.05 billion Tuesday in the inter-bank money market, according to the statistics. The central bank is continuously providing liquidity support to the commercial banks to ease the cash money demand in the market ahead of the Eid festival. As part of the move, the Bangladesh Bank (BB) injected fresh fund worth Tk 72.30 billion on the day through auction of repurchase agreement (repo), special repo and liquidity support to the primary dealers (PDs). The central bank earlier selected 15 PDs - 12 banks and three NBFIs - to deal with government securities in the secondary market. On Monday, the BB pumped funds worth Tk 66.76 billion using the same mechanisms, according to its statistics.