"They kept official rate in order to say there was no devaluation"

The National Bank withdrew limitations with regard to dollar exchange rate for enterprises. The first bidding on alternative rate will take place next week. The first deputy head of the National Bank's Administration Mikalaj Luzhin has informed the journalists about this.

Previously, the exchange rate at the over-the-counter market could differ from the official one by 10% only.

Economist Siarhej Chaly says that such step will "bring the market back to life".

Siarhej Chaly: “It is clear that this rate will differ from the official one by dozens per cent, but it will at least bring the market back to life and there will be new bargains in any case. The real sector (importers) will have an opportunity to work at least”.

As a result, two exchange rates will be created - official and alternative ones. The National Bank thinks they will correlate after some time... However, Siarhej Chaly does not think this is likely to happen.

This year the high-low lines of the Belarusian rouble to the currency basket (USD, Euro, Russian rouble) were restricted to +/- 8%. Everything that might happen to the official rate is its movement towards the high line.

 Siarhej Chaly: “It is clear that the rate which might create at the exchange house next week will not be that radically high as it used to be at the interbank - dollar's rate reached 5 thousand Br then. It will be closer to 4 thousand Br...

How these rates will develop and whether they will correlate I don't know and I strongly doubt it. They are most likely to differ from one another by 30-40%. In fact, we are dealing with legaдization of multiple currency exchange rates system”.

So, there will be two exchange rates in the country - official and alternative ones... What will happen to the currency basket then? It will be calculated in accordance with the official rate. Siarhej Chaly says that they kept the official rate in order to be able to sat there was no devaluation - they remained withing the +/- 8% borders.

 Siarhej Chaly: “What's the point of it? Why do they keep the official rate? In order to be able to say there was no devaluation. They just let this "bad" inporters to trade in accordance with the rate they want, pretending that this rate is in force for the citizens as well”.