Lebanese Forex Market
The Lebanese Pound (LP) steadied this week within the range of $/LP 1,514 – 1,514.5 against the dollar, with a mid-price of $/LP 1,514.25.
The peg continues to be supported by the Central Bank’s solid foreign assets, which stood at $36.59B by end-May 2019.
The dollarization ratio of private sector deposits remained stable at 70.62% in Dec. 2018 to 70.93% in April 2019.
The Euro strengthened against the dollar-pegged LBP, ending the week at €/LBP 1,691.28, compared to last week’s €/LBP 1,681.77. In its turn, the Nominal Effective Exchange Rate (NEER) of the LBP fell by 0.35% to 119.01 points by the week ending June 14.
International Forex Market
In the week ending June 14 2019, the USD fell against the Euro this week, due to weak economic data: US retail sales rose by 0.5% in May, compared to a 0.6% expected increase and weekly jobless claims totaled 222,000 vs an expected number of 216,000. As such, the Euro grew by a weekly 0.57% against the US Dollar, as the currency pair went from last week’s €/USD 1.1156 to €/USD 1.1219.
Commodities
Accordingly, gold prices rose over the week from $1,297.71/ounce by May 31, to $1,349.33/ounce, this week.