BoG to hold crunch meeting with Banks, Forex Bureau Association over forex supply

The Bank of Ghana will, on Tuesday, October 25, 2022, meet the Managing Directors of some banks and heads of the Forex Bureau Association to discuss measures to ensure a constant supply of forex in the forex market. 

This is aimed at ensuring that traders who need forex for the legitimate business get it at specific places and to halt the overpricing of some commodities due to the rush for the forex. 

Information Minister Kojo Oppong Nkrumah announced this at an emergency media briefing in Accra, on Monday. 

The decision follows speculations that some people are hoarding the US dollar in order to increase the price ahead of the Christmas season. 

The Minister stated that the Economic Management Team would also meet today, October 24, 2022, to discuss several economic issues, including measures to stabilise the Cedi’s rapid depreciation against the major trading currencies.

The government, he said, was making plans to ensure the forex trade was stabilised even as it was expecting more inflows of forex, following the completion of the syndication of the Ghana COCOBOD transaction. 

Meanwhile, Cabinet is expected to meet from Thursday, October 27 to 29, for the third quarter meeting, to apprise itself of the Economic Management Team’s meetings, especially on the International Monetary Fund (IMF) negotiations and the way forward towards ensuring a stable and robust fiscal regime. 

The Ghanaian Cedi has tumbled rapidly on the Interbank forex rates, trading against the US dollar at a buying price of GHS12.5244 and selling price of GHS12.5370 on Monday, October 24, 2022.

This has resulted in an increment of the prices of some essential items due to the high demand for the dollar to buy commodities on the international market. 

The Cedi has depreciated against the dollar by more than 52 per cent this year, thus making it one of the worst performing currencies in the world, according to Bloomberg. 

The Ghana Statistical Service announced that the country’s inflation for September stood at 37.2 percent thus, resulting in unstable prices for essential items.

Source: GNA