Colombia central bank board chief defends foreign exchange policy

By Nelson Bocanegra

BOGOTA, July 21 (Reuters) – The board main of Colombia’s central bank on Thursday defended the monetary policy authority’s determination not to intervene in movements of the country’s peso, even as market volatility pushed other central financial institutions in the location to acquire motion.

Colombia’s currency COP=STFX fell 2.3% to 4,424 pesos to the dollar early in the session, scarcely a week due to the fact it hit file lows from the U.S. forex as fears of recession in the United States and Europe boosted the dollar’s attractiveness as a refuge asset.

“The central bank’s plan is to depart the exchange level float freely, simply because when there is totally free-float it carries the adjustment mechanism with it,” board main Leonardo Villar said in a virtual meeting structured by expense manager Skandia.

“The essential thing for the potential is the viewpoint that things can go up or down and that the current market by itself is in cost of modifying them,” he reported, including the banking institutions place would discourage money flows transferring in just one particular path.

Last 7 days, Chile’s central financial institution agreed to a $25 billion intervention in the overseas exchange market due to the modern progress of the US greenback.

Colombia’s central financial institution previous intervened in the overseas exchange market place in 2020 for the duration of the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic, when it adopted measures to boost liquidity in bucks.

Whilst most analysts rule out the risk that Colombia’s central lender would adopt measures to have the peso’s volatility, some argue it is time that the monetary coverage authority make its existence felt amid broad turbulence in just one way or yet another.

“We never foresee intervention in international exchange,” Julio Cesar Romero, main economist at investment decision keeping enterprise Corficolombiana, stated.

“Having said that, we believe that that now is the time for an intervention to enhance the liquidity in dollars in the method and enable mitigate the volatility of the peso versus the dollar,” he additional.

(Reporting by Nelson Bocanegra Crafting by Oliver Griffin Modifying by Alistair Bell)

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