Bangladesh Bank has held its key policy repo rate steady at 10 percent for the first half of the current fiscal year, reaffirming its commitment to a tight monetary stance aimed at curbing persistent inflation, weak private investment, and growing uncertainty over global trade.
Diversifying Bangladesh’s export basket has been a high-priority policy objective for many years.
Some banks are simply non-viable and suffer from inherent governance problems.
There is ample evidence showing that both domestic and foreign direct investment (FDI) have a significant positive effect on economic growth.
The finance ministry has identified seven major challenges including tight monetary and fiscal policies, taken to tame elevated inflation levels for more than three years, in next fiscal year that may increase unemployment.
The estimate is almost close to the projection by the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) 3.8 percent for the year.
The silver lining is that the economy isn’t falling apart
The Bangladesh Bank will consider slashing the policy rate to 7 percent by March, provided that rampant inflation, which has hovered above 9 percent for nearly two years, eases to 5 percent by then, Governor Ahsan H Mansur said yesterday.
Bangladesh's agro-processed exports are already rising.
The deficit in Bangladesh’s financial account widened further in the first nine months of the ongoing fiscal year, an indication that the current instability in the foreign exchange market will continue in the coming months.
Four state-run commercial banks registered 29 per cent year-on-year spike in bad loans in 2022 as the central bank’s relaxed classification rules introduced in the wake of the Covid-19 outbreak ended and their inefficient lending persisted.
Businesses are set up to make a profit. We all understand that. But to what extent that profit would be made?
Bangladesh’s exports to Asian markets are growing steadily thanks to increasing demand from several major markets but the country needs to sign trade pacts and diversify products in a continent where the consumer class is fast expanding.
The business sector in Bangladesh has been going through severe challenges for the past four years, which, for many, have been the toughest period in decades, with the coronavirus pandemic being the dominant factor in the early part before the Russia-Ukraine war broke out. Today, we are running the last report of a series and it focuses on the lessons for the businesses from the two unprecedented shocks.
The poverty rate in Bangladesh has declined to 18.7 per cent and the extreme poverty rate stood at 5.6 per cent, according to the latest data from the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS).
Mess residents’ struggle highlights vulnerability to high food prices
Mohammad Firoz works at a garment accessories manufacturing company and earns Tk 29,000 per month.
Economists yesterday stressed on addressing the persistently high inflation, macroeconomic stability and low revenue base in the pre-budget session for the upcoming fiscal year with the finance minister.
With Ramadan coming up, people’s woes will increase.
