NBR has spent 11bn euros to defend the RON since crisis started, ING says

The National Bank of Romania has spent around 11 billion euros to stabilise the exchange rate since the onset of the financial crisis on the Romanian market in October 2008, believe ING Bank analysts. This is half the volume of NBR reserves at the beginning of the crisis.
Central bank officials said repeatedly they would not tolerate very abrupt exchange rate fluctuations or major deviations from the levels justified by conditions of the real economy. However, the RON has since lost round 20% against the euro, with the exchange rate climbing from 3.6 RON/euro in October 2008 to a 4.4 RON/euro high reached this summer. NBR representatives did not provide comment on the information yesterday. In the meantime, the NBR’s foreign exchange reserve has climbed by five billion euros, from 27.3 to 32.5 billion euros, but only thanks to external loans taken out by the state. The central bank’s own funds on the other hand fell from 14 billion euros in September 2008, to just 4.2 billion euros in September this year.
“The 4.2 billion-euro difference up to 32.6 billion euros – the level of the official foreign exchange reserves in September 2010 – is accounted for by loans from the European Commission, the International Monetary Fund and the other investors that financed the budget deficit (by purchasing eurobonds i.e.) and by commercial banks’ minimum requirements, of around 6.5 billion euros,” says Nicolaie Alexandru-Chideșciuc, chief economist of ING Bank.