According to the Central Bank’s (BDL) balance sheet, total assets recorded an increase by 3.48% since year-start, to stand at $146.28B in 2020. In fact, this can be mainly attributed to the rise in “Gold” account (10.13% of total asset) by 6.33% to reach $14.82B in March 2020. In details, Gold prices rose by 3.56% to $1,587.22/ounce since the start of the year till end March 2020.
BDL foreign assets (constituting 24.09% of total assets) recorded a year to date decline by 5.47% ($2B) to reach $35.23B in March 2020. In fact, the Central Bank is using its foreign assets to cover the imports of essential goods, including fuel, wheat, medicine, and industrial raw materials. Worth mentioning that since the start of the year Bdl Eurobonds dropped by $700M to reach $5.03B.
Meanwhile, BDL’s Securities portfolio (26.22% of total assets) added 0.95% year-to-date (YTD) to settle at $38.35B in March 2020. In their turn, Loans to the local financial sector (10.13% of total assets) witnessed a downtick by 0.78% to $14.82B in March 2020..
On the liabilities side, Financial Sector Deposits (77.31% of BDL’s total liabilities) rose by 0.96% YTD to settle at $113B in March 2020, while Public sector deposits (3.06% of total liabilities) decreased by 17.82% YTD to stand at $4.47B over the same period, as the government was withdrawing these deposits to cover part of its budget deficit. Worth mentioning that Currency in Circulation outside BDL (6.55% of BDL’s total liabilities) rose by 26.80% YTD to stand at $9.58B in March 2020. In fact, the increase in Currency in circulation (in addition to Demand deposits in LBP) is due to the prevailing financial instability and to the Lebanese preferring to keep cash money.
BDL Total and Foreign Assets in March
Source: BDL