Citi Business News’ analysis shows a continuous streak of the local currency for a greater part of this year.

For this year alone, the cedi has depreciated by about 5 percent on the interbank foreign exchange market.

The year started with a dollar trading at 4 cedis 20 pesewas.

Presently, you will need as much as 4 cedis 41 pesewas to buy a dollar.

For the first nine months, the cedi depreciated between 0.7 and 3 percent.

The General Manager of Treasury at HFC, Joseph Nketsia attributes the depreciation to the relatively low supply of dollars and increased imports ahead of the festive season.

“If the intervention by the central bank is not enough to stem the tide then the cedi will continue to depreciate against the major currencies,” he said.

Quarter on quarter performance 

The highest depreciation has been that recorded between January and March this year.

The cedi depreciated by as much as 14 pesewas, from 4 cedis 20 pesewas to 4 cedis 34 pesewas.

Subsequently, the local currency depreciated by about one percent or 4 pesewas in the second quarter; from 4 cedis 32 pesewas to 4 cedis 36 pesewas.

This was followed by about 0.7 percent depreciation in the third quarter where the currency depreciated by some 3 pesewas to trade between 4 cedis 37 pesewas and 4 cedis 40 pesewas.

Businesses want solution 

But concerns of low supply of the dollar are confirmed by some forex bureaus in the national capital.

Owura, an attendant at a forex bureau in Adabraka says they are shot of dollars.

“Right now, we don’t have any dollar so what we do is we buy and we sell it immediately. This is because the possibility of its value reducing is very high and we will lose as a result,” he explained.

Also, importers are but one of the many businesses facing the brunt of the depreciation.

An Executive member of the Ghana Union of Traders Association (GUTA) Benjamin Yeboah wants authorities to intervene and reverse the trend to reduce their plight.

“This currency issue has always been an issue for traders and the business people in the sense that it is not readily available at the banks and therefore people will have to roam outside the banking sectors in search of dollars and that to me is not the very best,” he lamented.

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By: Jessica Ayorkor Aryee & Bobbie Osei/citibusinessnews.com/Ghana

The post Cedi depreciates by 5% in 2017 appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

He asserted that, the government did indeed proposed clear policies, anchored in fiscal discipline, to tackle the depreciation of the Cedi, contrary to the opinion of some critics.

[contextly_sidebar id=”e41E0tAj9gn0fVqSQSRgxmBZYObg84LJ”]The cedi commenced 2017 at GHc 4.2 on the interbank foreign exchange market, but figures from the Bank of Ghana show that the cedi depreciated by about 5.4 percent between January and February 2017 on the interbank forex exchange market, and as much as 6.72 percent in the same period across forex bureaus.

Pressure on Cedi at year’s turn

Not to make light of the situation, Mr. Oppong-Nkrumah, in an interview with Citi News‘ Duke Mensah Opoku, noted that, per the Bank of Ghana’s currency monitoring report from 2000 to 2016, the Cedi experiences an average depreciation of about 5 percent indicating pressure on the Cedi at the beginning of the year.

“There is pressure on the Cedi at this time of the onset of the year, which stems from foreign companies mobilizing dollars to repatriate abroad coupled with people mobilizing up dollars for importation, he explained.

Policies will keep foreign exchange inward

Whilst noting that the situation with the Cedi was nothing extraordinary, he stressed that government had outlined clear policies to alleviate the situation.

For one, he said government plans to put in place policies “that will strengthen private inward remittance flows which will develop financial products that will encourage remittance flows into investments.”

“What that means is that, government is putting in place measures to make it attractive for people who otherwise would not bring their currency ordinarily into Ghana, to bring their currency into Ghana,” the MP explained.

“We are also looking at reducing the foreign exchange outflows with respect to trade in services such as freight and insurance expenses on imported goods, because very often, people have to send dollars abroad as part of services associated with imports. We are looking at taking these ones away so that people don’t have to repatriate some of those monies abroad.”

“So it is not true that the budget doesn’t say anything about the Cedi or that there are no plans. We have clear policy outlines and there is work being done. My comment on the Floor of the House has been that, for our own political exigencies, we shouldn’t send panic into the system,” Mr. Oppong Nkrumah stated.

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By: Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana

The post Budget gave clear policy to tackle falling Cedi – Oppong-Nkrumah appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.