Growth no longer justified

The National Bank of Romania’s (NBR) foreign currency reserves, now totalling 5.82bn euros, will primarily keep up with the import growth pace and will consider covering the refinancing of the private foreign debt from banking sources. This was one of the signals conveyed to bankers by NBR’s vice-governor Cristian Popa on Friday, during one of the periodical meetings between NBR representatives and bankers. “In case refinancing of the foreign debt on the banking market outgrows the banks’ external positions, we will be ready to offer foreign currency on the market so that banks could meet the clients’ demands. At the same time, the foreign currency level is comfortable and will pursue a gradual growth calculated in months of import,” Popa added.
He said that as far as the central bank was concerned, there was no longer any reason to maintain the same growth pace (about $2bn in 2002) for the foreign currency reserve. A $700-$800 million increase in 2003 could be considered on schedule, as the dynamic of the reserves is actually a correlation of the foreign private debt dynamic and the foreign currency positions of the commercial banks. ZF