BB buys $353m more, total hits $1.74b

Bangladesh Bank (BB) has gone for another round of US dollar purchases from commercial banks, and this time the amount is $353 million.

The banking regulator bought the greenback from 26 commercial banks through an auction yesterday, reacting to the sharp drop in the US dollar rate.

As a result, the total US dollars purchased through auctions hit $1.74 billion in the current fiscal year, according to BB data.

In yesterday's auction, the cut-off rate was Tk 121.75 per dollar.

On the same day, the interbank exchange rate ranged from Tk 121.70 to Tk 121.75 per US dollar.

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BB buys record $265m from banks in a day

Stronger remittances and exports, together with the central bank's buying spree, have helped lift the country's foreign exchange reserves, which stood at $25.67 billion as of September 11 this year, according to the International Monetary Fund's calculation.

In the same period last year, the country's reserves stood at $24.50 billion, central bank data showed.

In the three years leading up to the 2024-25 fiscal year, BB sold more than $25 billion from its foreign exchange reserves to pay for fuel, fertiliser, and food imports.

However, the banking watchdog suspended dollar sales for government imports, citing depleted reserves, after the ouster of the Awami League-led government in a mass uprising in August last year.

In an interview with foreign media, BB Governor Ahsan H Mansur said their target is to raise the forex reserve to $40 billion.

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BB buys additional $134m from banks

A senior BB official said the dollar purchase was carried out to stabilise the forex market, since sharp upward or downward movements are not good for stability.

Earlier, in May, BB adopted a floating exchange rate regime to meet conditions tied to a $5.5 billion IMF loan programme, a year after introducing a crawling peg system under which the exchange rate moved within a band.

Central bank officials said that despite the market-based exchange rate, they would intervene if the rate rose above Tk 123 per dollar or fell below Tk 121, maintaining the exchange rate band.