Central Bank's currency reserves increase by 9pct
By Sara Israfilbayova
The volume of currency reserves at the disposal of the Central Bank of Azerbaijan (CBA) has increased by $367 million (or 9 percent) to $4,433 billion in March 2017 as compared to last year.
The CBA reported that its reserves increased by $63.4 million (1.45 percent) in a month .
The currency reserves of the Central Bank decreased by more than $1 billion (20.78 percent) in 2016 as compared to 2015.
Reserves of the CBA began to decline beginning from July 2014 following an increase in demand for US dollar in the country. This process proceeded at a slow pace (within $20-50 million) at the beginning, but accelerated from December 2014 demonstrating a sharp decline.
Currency reserves showed an upward trend during 2016, increasing by 0.9 percent in March, 1.35 percent in April, 0.7 percent in August, and 0.14 percent in November.
Overall, CBA’s currency reserves decreased by $1,042.3 million or 20.78 percent in 2016 as compared to 2015.
The country's currency reserves are formed based on reserves of the Central Bank (CBA), the State Oil Fund (SOFAZ), and treasury means of the Finance Ministry.
As of October 1, the assets of SOFAZ reached $35.82 billion, with some $33.95 billion accounting for the investment portfolio and 1.87 billion falling to a share of manat account. The Fund plans to increase its assets by $1 billion in 2017.
The recently developed strategic Road Map for the prospects of the national economy of Azerbaijan envisages that the Central Bank will implement a full switch to the regime of floating rate in 2017.
The official exchange rate of Azerbaijan’s national currency, the manat, against the U.S. dollar was set at 1.7244 AZN/USD for April 4, according to the Central Bank of Azerbaijan
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