Help, my brains on vacation!!
Does todays kawait/USD exchange rate today equal $3.57? It says .28 but I can't remember how to convert that to USD? I hope I did it right! LOL
The region seems to on the move
http://www.gulf-times.com/site/images/email.gifhttp://www.gulf-times.com/site/images/saperator.gifhttp://www.gulf-times.com/site/images/print.gifMarkets focus on UAE dollar peghttp://www.gulf-times.com/site/images/spacer.gif Published: Tuesday, 22 May, 2007, 08:40 AM Doha Timehttp://www.gulf-times.com/mritems/im...0592_1_248.jpgA Kuwaiti man buys US dollars from a currency exchange in Kuwait City on Sunday. After Kuwait, the UAE is the most likely candidate to loosen a dollar peg, according to a Reuters surveyDUBAI: The United Arab Emirates central bank kept markets guessing yesterday on whether it might change its foreign exchange policy, after Kuwait dropped its dollar peg and adopted an exchange rate based on a basket of currencies.
A UAE revaluation, seen as more likely after Kuwait’s switch on Sunday, would make regional monetary union even more difficult by a 2010 deadline and send another bearish signal from Gulf oil exporters about the outlook for the weak dollar.
Kuwait will now need to buy fewer US assets when it accumulates reserves to defend the exchange rate, although the impact on dollar would be negligible, Scandinavian bank Nordea said in a research note.
“If other countries in the region will follow, however, we see a risk of a modest dollar weakening,” it said.
After Kuwait, the UAE was the most likely candidate to loosen a dollar peg which the six oil producers had agreed would stay in place until monetary union, according to analysts polled by Reuters in March. “We shall be closely watching the UAE, which should be the next one on the list,” said Elisabeth Gruie, Emerging Markets Strategist at BNP Paribas in London.
However, the office of UAE central bank governor Sultan Nasser al-Suweidi said he would not comment.
Kuwait cited its inflation rate, which touched 3.7% in December and 5.5% at the end of March, as the main reason for abandoning its dollar peg.
With the dollar hitting a record low against the euro in April, Kuwait’s central bank was forced to act in the “national interest” and break ranks with fellow Gulf Arabs states over the currency pegs, the central bank said on Sunday.
The UAE, where inflation hit 10% at the end of last year, and Qatar, with record inflation of 11.83% in 2006, had more reason to cushion their economies from the rising cost of imports, Citigroup analyst David Lubin said in a note.
Qatar’s central bank governor ruled any change of exchange rate policy yesterday. The central banks of Saudi Arabia, the largest Arab economy, Oman and Bahrain did the same on Sunday.
“A build up of speculative positions betting on further revaluations in the region seems very likely now,” Lubin said in the note.
The UAE dirham hit a one-week high of 3.6710 per dollar compared with its official peg of 3.67275. The Saudi riyal touched a six-week high at 3.7498 per dollar, just off its official 3.75 per dollar peg.
Like Kuwait, the UAE cut interest rates in April to deter speculators betting that the central bank would allow the currency to appreciate as the dollar slid.
Suweidi first raised the prospect of a currency revaluation in an interview with Reuters in January, although he has repeatedly said he would not act alone.
“The UAE has said it won’t move unilaterally, but now it wouldn’t be (acting) unilaterally,” said Steve Brice, chief Middle East economist at Standard Chartered Bank in Dubai.
Kuwait also cited the diminishing prospect of meeting the 2010 deadline for a single currency as one factor behind its decision to drop the dollar peg, adopted in 2003 to create a platform regional economic integration.
Meanwhile, an Islamic member of Jordan’s parliamentary Economic Affairs Committee yesterday urged the government to follow Kuwait’s steps in ending the 12-year-old peg between the national currency, the dinar, and the US dollar.
“Jordan should follow Kuwait’s steps in tying the dinar to a basket of currencies, because the drastic decline in the dollar’s exchange rate is having negative repercussions on the Jordanian economy,” Jaafer Hourani said.
“The decline of the dollar’s exchange rate versus other major currencies has also helped to shrink the purchasing power of the Jordanian dinar and spur the inflation rate,” he added.
Hourani belongs to the Islamic Action Front (IAF), Jordan’s largest political party, which is at odds with the US policy in the region.
The Jordanian dinar has been pegged to the greenback since October 1995.
Central Bank of Jordan officials have shun calls for ending the dinar-dollar peg, saying it bestowed stability on the country’s commercial dealings with other parts of the world.
Hourani contended that the continuation of the dinar-dollar relationship was motivated by “political reasons.” – Reuters, DPA
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