Lebanese Forex Market
The Lebanese Pound (LP) steadied during the past 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 $36.39B by end-June 2019.
The dollarization ratio of private sector deposits increased slightly from 70.62% in Dec. 2018 to 71.22% in May 2019. As for the average interbank rate it stood at 6.05% f July 12,2019 comparing to 6.8% last week.
The Euro appreciated against the dollar-pegged LP, ending the week at €/LBP 1,695.97, compared to last week’s €/LBP 1,695.34. As for the Nominal Effective Exchange Rate (NEER) of the LBP, it recorded a 0.37% weekly rise to reach 118.29 points.
International Forex Market
In the week ending July 12 2019, the Euro/USD currency pair went from last week’s €/USD 1.1246 to €/USD 1.1250 this week. The dollar was broadly weaker across the board in Europe. In fact, its performance was affected during the week after the U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell stated on Wednesday that the economic outlook hadn’t improved in recent weeks and emphasized several risks which indicated a possible interest rates cut for the first time in nearly a decade in Central Bank next meeting on July 30-31.
Commodities
Accordingly, gold prices climbed from $1,400.00/ounce last week to $1,408.40/ounce in the week ending July 12 2019.