DHAKA: Bangladesh’s foreign exchange reserves have crossed the $26 billion mark for the first time.
On Monday, the reserves reached $26.03 billion, enough to foot the import bill of at least seven months, said Kazi Sayedur Rahman, general manager of Bangladesh Bank’s Forex Reserve and Treasury Management Department.
He attributed the rise to the increased inflow of remittance from the expatriates and earnings from exports.
International standards require a country to have reserves to meet import costs of at least three months.
Bangladesh clears Asian Clearing Union (ACU) bills every two months.
Lesser than normal spending on import of fuel oil and commodities also played a role in the reserves increasing, Rahman told bdnews24.com.
According to the central bank data, forex reserves were a little over $21 billion on June 31 last year.
For the first time in the country’s history, the reserves had crossed the $23 billion mark on Feb 26 this year.
But, the figure dropped to $22 billion after the central bank cleared import bills for January-February period amounting $1.01 billion to ACU in the first week of March.
The reserves again crossed $23 billion on Mar 30 and exceeded $24 billion on Apr 29.
The reserves soared over the $25 billion mark on June 25.
The payment of $1 billion in ACU bills in the first week of July saw it drop to $24.4 billion on July 8. But it recovered within a week to rise to $25 billion again on July 14.
Kazi Sayedur Rahman on Monday said forex reserves would remain at $26 billion until the first week of September before the import bills for July-August period would be paid to ACU.
