Money changers allowed to keep maximum $25,000 in hand

Money changers allowed to keep maximum $25,000 in hand

The Bangladesh Bank on Thursday asked money exchange houses trading in foreign currencies to hold maximum $25,000 at the end of a business day.

The BB issued a circular in this regard on the day.

‘The maximum stock of cash foreign currency held by money changers must not exceed $25,000 or equivalent at the close of each business day,’ according to the circular issued by BB’s Foreign Exchange Policy Department.

Cash foreign currency beyond this limit shall either be encashed with any AD or deposited to the foreign currency account maintained with the designated AD of the concerned money changer.

When needed, cash foreign currency can be withdrawn from the FC account, it said.

However, the balance of that FC account must not exceed $50,000 or equivalent at any point of time, the circular said.

In addition, a money changer can keep maximum Tk 50 lakh in hand and the amount beyond this limit must be deposited to the money changers’ current deposit account.

The foreign currency reserve in Bangladesh dropped to $34.26 billion on Thursday as the Bangladesh Bank increased dollar sales to tackle the greenback crisis on the market.

According to the suggestion of the International Monetary Fund, if $8 billion used as export development fund is excluded from the foreign exchange reserve, the reserve would stand at $26.3 billion. It is the lowest in seven years.

The dollar crisis worsened amid high import payments and low remittance and export earnings.

The exchange rate rose sharply to Tk 107 from Tk 84.8 against the US dollar within a year. The BB approved floating rate of dollars on September 14.

The BB sold over $5.47 billion to banks in between July 1 and November 9 while in the whole year of 2021-22, it injected total $7.62 billion into the financial market, according to the BB data.

State-run banks, in particular, are taking dollar support from the BB for settling import payments of Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation, Bangladesh Agricultural Development Corporation and Bangladesh Chemical Industries Corporation and others.

The reserve was $39.06 billion on August 31, 2022 and $46.2 billion in September 2021.