YEREVAN, March 30. /ARKA/. Armenia, with its present government reserves, may fail to repay its foreign liabilities, Bagrat Asatryan, former head of the central bank says in his ‘Armenia in Anticipation of New Crunch’ analysis published in Chorrrord Ishkhanutyun Newspaper.
«Taking into account the widening gap in the payment balance and the fact that Armenia’s foreign debt seven times bigger than the country’s government reserves, we can come to conclusion that fulfillment of Armenia’s foreign obligations is under threat now,» he said.
The regulator, disregarding the mentioned circumstances, continues interfering in things at the forex market by making interventions here.
In addition to a one-third reduction of international reserves in 2014, they shrank again by about $140 million to $ 1351 million in January 2015.
It means foreign reserves contacted to 3.5 of the monthly ratio of international reserves to import.
Asatryan finds the regulator’s interference in forex market developments unacceptable – if interference happens, it should be open to public and clearly regulated.
He is convinced that the central bank should let the national currency float, stop making shocking decisions and embark on a consistent, transparent and predictable policy instead.
The central bank should work out short-term and mid-term programs of monetary measures and release them to public as soon as possible.
The measures to be taken should be described in the programs – there should be general approaches, monetary policy, interest rate policy and principles of the obligatory reservation instrument application within the next two years.
Asatryan thinks that special attention should be paid here to the steps to be taken to stabilize the financial sector, particularly banking segment. –0–
