Active intervention of Central Bank strengthened dram from 485 to 482 AMD/$1 on December 21-28

ArmInfo. Central Bank of Armenia continued active interventions in order to strengthen dram.  Thus, on December 21-25 Central Bank made interventions in forex inter-bank on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday, when the daily transactions were 4-5mln USD, due to which the transactions of NASDAQ OMX Armenia grew 2.2-fold for the reported week. As a result dram strengthened from 485 to 482 AMD/$1.

According to the CB press office, on December 21 through 25, NASDAQ OMX Armenia was active only on Friday - $2.9 mln with the exchange rate at 479.00 AMD/1USD. The inter-bank forex market operated throughout the week actively with interventions of the CB on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday, making transactions for a total of $18.670 mln for the week and forming the average exchange rate at the level of 480.50 AMD/1USD. To note, the latest large interventions of the Central Bank were on December 11 - more than $6 million, November 13 - $19.6 mln, on October 2 - supposedly $6 mln, on September 19 - $22.2 mln and August 28 - $95 mln.

The source says that on December 21-25, on the intrabank currency market (transactions with customers) the banks bought $135.97 mln (22.5% growth versus the previous week) at the average exchange rate of 479.34 AMD/$1, and sold $134.7 mln (9.8% growth versus the previous week) at the average exchange rate of 481.36 AMD/$1. In the meantime, the banks bought 13.5 mln EUR (up 32%) at the average exchange rate of 521.89 AMD/1EUR, and sold 18.9 mln EUR (weekly growth 7.2%) at the exchange rate of 525.33 AMD/1EUR. The banks also bought 1.3 bln RUR (up 8.3%) at the average exchange rate of 6.74 AMD/1RUR and sold 574.7 mln RUR (3% weekly decline) at the exchange rate of 6.84 AMD/1RUR.

During the previous week (December 14-20) the Armenian banks provided AMD loans worth 48.1 bln AMD and USD loans worth $46.2 mln.  As compared with the previous week (December 7- December 13), AMD loans decreased by 6.7% and the ones in terms of USD declined 15.1%.  

To recall, during the last months of 2014 the forex market of Armenia registered a sharp rise of the AMD/USD exchange rate - over 570 AMD/1USD. From October through December 17, 2014, AMD depreciated by almost 45% in the retail forex market of Armenia, In 2014, in the retail forex market of Armenia, the AMD depreciated against USD by 40%, with the maximum indicator (570 AMD) fixed on Dec 17 and the minimum (406 AMD) registered in July.  Over 2014, NASDAQ OMX Armenia registered transactions worth a total of $744.5 mln, with the biggest amount falling on November ($117 mln). Over the year the exchange rate on NASDAQ OMX Armenia rose from 407.14 to 560 AMD/$1 (on Dec 17 the exchange rate rose by 22%), dropping to 470 AMD/$1 by Dec 27. In the course of the 11 months of 2015, in the retail forex market AMD appreciated from 477 to 483 against USD; from 571.5 to 512 against EUR, at the same time depreciating from 8.2 to 7.4 against RUR. The average USD/AMD exchange rate on Dec 11 made up 485 AMD/1$. The national currency depreciated against EUR (530 AMD/1EUR) and appreciated against RUR (7.1 AMD/1RUR).