The National Bank of Ethiopia today held the second foreign exchange auction. It sold foreign currency especially US dollar for birr to local banks. Yesterday NBE announced that on Tuesday it would sell $60 million to local banks.
According to a statement issued by the Ethiopian banking regulator, 27 banks participated in today’s auction and average selling price of one US dollar was 135.6185 birr,
In August last year, the NBE held its first FX auction for private local banks. Back then, 27 banks bought US dollars from NBE at a price of 107.9 birr per dollar.
Ethiopian birr has been falling against US dollar since July 2024 when Ethiopian government introduced macro economic reforms to get a bailout package from the IMF and World Bank.
The selling price of US dollar in Ethiopian black market is around 150 birr. Since July last year, the Ethiopian government has been trying to kill the foreign currency exchange black market. Though the gap in dollar’s official and black market prices has narrowed considerably, the black market still seems to be flourishing.
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