DUSHANBE, June 30, 2010, Asia-Plus — Tajikistan’s gold and currency reserves have reached 420 million U.S. dollars by June this year, Chairman of the National Bank of Tajikistan (NBT), Sharif Rahimzoda, remarked at a session of the Majlisi Namoyandagon (Tajikistan’s lower chamber of parliament) on June 30.
According to him, the gold and currency reserves are now equal to the country”s foreign trade turnover for two months, while under international standards the gold and currency reserves must be equal to the volume of country’s foreign trade turnover for three months.
We will recall that Rahimzoda told reporters in Dushanbe on April 26 this year that Tajikistan’s gold and currency reserves rose 9.8 percent in three months to March 31, 2010, reaching 385.8 million U.S. dollars.
The central bank head also noted that inflation for the first five months of 2010 stood at 2.2 percent and it is expected to stand at 9 percent by the end of the year.
“To-date, NBT’s external debts have amounted to some 220 million U.S. dollars,” said Mr. Rahimzoda, “In the meantime, the bank’s money supply rose 40 percent in the first five months of this year and monetary aggregates that are in circulation rose some 29 percent over the same period.”
Rahimzoda noted that the central bank has purchased some one ton of gold from abroad and more than 350 kilograms of gold from Tajikistan-based gold mining companies since the beginning of this year. “We will begin to realize gold after its international prices rise,” he said.
The NBT head also noted that share of foreign capital in banks in Tajikistan was now not more than 30 percent that complied with international standards.
On the loan interest rates set by NBT, Rahimzoda said that they now did not exceed 8 percent, while in 1996, they reached even 260 percent.
