Remittance, export earnings cool heated forex market

Country's foreign-exchange market eased slightly Wednesday as an upturn in both remittance inflow and export earnings began to take the heat out of the greenback, bankers said.
"Higher inflow of remittance and rising trend of export earnings have contributed to improving supply of the foreign currency on the market in the last couple of days," a senior treasury official of a commercial bank told the FE.
The US dollar was quoted at Tk 77.8500 on the day against Tk 77.8450 on the previous working day, according to the market operators.
On the other hand, the rate of the greenback for BC (bills for collection) selling at customer level came down to maximum Tk 78.85 Wednesday from Tk 79.20 on December 1.
The exchange rate was Tk 78.00 against the dollar on November 11 this year.
"Higher inflow of foreign currency has helped to ease the rate of the US dollar for BC selling at customer level," the treasury official explained.
The flow of inward remittances increased by nearly 15 per cent to US$1.17 billion in November 2014 from $1.02 billion in the previous month, according to the central bank statistics.
On the other hand, overall export earnings picked up by 23.49 per cent to $2.42 billion in November last from $1.96 billion in October 2014.
Besides, selling of the US dollar by the central bank to the commercial banks directly has contributed to cooling the market, the market operators observed.
Earlier on November 24 this year, the Bangladesh Bank (BB) resumed intervention in the foreign-exchange market through selling the US dollar to the commercial banks directly after nearly two years and a half to keep the market stable.
As part of the move, the central bank has so far sold $228 million to the commercial banks to meet the growing demand for the main trading currency.
 "We may continue such intervention in line with the market requirement," a BB senior official told the FE, without elaborating.
The demand for the US dollar had picked up mainly due to higher import-payment pressures particularly for petroleum products, fertiliser, capital machinery and scrap vessels.
Besides, over $100 million was paid in the last week for Padma Bridge that has created an additional pressure on the forex market, according to the bankers.
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