Ahead of upcoming Asian Clearing Union (ACU) bill payments, Bangladesh Bank has purchased $80 million from the domestic foreign exchange market, boosting the country′s gross reserves to $35.30 billion.
The central bank bought the dollars from three commercial banks at a rate of Tk122.75 per dollar on Tuesday. According to the IMF’s BPM6 method, net reserves stood at $30.61 billion at the end of the day.
Central bank sources said Bangladesh is scheduled to settle its ACU bills for March and April next week. To maintain liquidity balance in the market, the central bank has purchased a total of $80 million over the past two days, $50 million on Tuesday, and $30 million the previous day, both at the same exchange rate.
In the current fiscal year 2025-26, Bangladesh Bank has so far bought a total of $5.75 billion from the market. Of that amount, $80 million was purchased just this month.
Prior to these dollar purchases, at the end of Sunday, BPM6 reserves stood at $30.51 billion while gross reserves were $35.20 billion.
The central bank had previously purchased dollars on 2 March at Tk122.30 per dollar. Later, on 15 April, the rate was raised to Tk122.75 per dollar. At this revised rate, dollars have now been purchased from the market on three separate occasions.
In March, Bangladesh paid $1.37 billion to settle its ACU bills.
Meanwhile, the highest rate for dollar transactions in the interbank foreign exchange market on Tuesday was also Tk122.75 per dollar. According to relevant sources, nearly $45 million was traded among banks at this rate the previous day.
