Central bank "has enough reserves to defend currency"

Central bank "has enough reserves to defend currency"

BELGRADE -- Governor of the National Bank of Serbia (NBS) Jorgovanka Tabaković says the NBS "has enough FX reserves to defend the national currency."

She revealed that the bank bought EUR 20 million just before the weekend for the first time this year, after only selling foreign currency for the last three months.

"In this way, over a total of 86 days in 2014, EUR 820 million has been sold on the foreign exchange market,” Tabaković said for Sunday’s issue of Belgrade-based daily Blic.

She added that the NBS intervened on the market to ease the excessive daily volatility of the local currency and facilitate trade on the FX market.

She said that the Serbian dinar has been weakening since the beginning of the year due to a seasonal increase in FX demand by energy importers and also trends in the global financial market.

Tabaković pointed out that the NBS foreign exchange reserves are currently at a very high level – EUR 10.6 billion - which is way more than set in all, even the strictest, criteria for the optimum size of foreign exchange reserves.