New Dollar Rates Effective from Monday

Banks have increased the price of the dollar from a minimum of 50 paisa to a maximum of 1 taka. The new price is effective from Monday (September 3).

Earlier, in a meeting last Thursday (August 31), the Bangladesh Foreign Exchange Dealers Association (BAFEDA) and the Association of Bankers, Bangladesh (ABB) decided to increase the price of the dollar.

As a result of the increase in prices, exporters will now get 109 taka 50 paisa against every dollar, and expatriates will also get 109 taka 50 paisa against every dollar of remittances. With this new decision, the dollar value of exports and remittances has been brought to the same level. Earlier, the dollar value of remittances was higher than that of exports.

According to the new decision, the price per dollar against imports will be a maximum of Rs 110. Due to the increase in prices, importers will have to spend more money than before to open letters of credit, thereby increasing the cost of importing goods.

Earlier, banks were officially paying expatriates 109 rupees per dollar and exporters 108 rupees 50 paise per dollar.

After the start of the Russia-Ukraine war, the dollar crisis in the country became evident in March last year. To deal with this crisis, Bangladesh Bank fixed the price of the dollar at the beginning. This increases the crisis.

Last fiscal year, the central bank sold 13.58 billion dollars. And in the fiscal year 2021-22, it sold 7.62 billion dollars. As a result of the sale of dollars, the country's foreign exchange reserves have consistently decreased to 23 billion dollars. In August 2021, it peaked above $48 billion.

Later in September, Bangladesh Bank withdrew from the responsibility of determining the price of the dollar. This responsibility is given to ABB and BAFEDA. Since then, the two organizations have been jointly fixing the dollar price for export and remittance earnings and the payment of import liabilities. Basically, these two organizations are implementing the decision of the Bangladesh Bank. In the first two months of the current fiscal year, sales exceeded $2 billion.