Expert: Central Bank Reserves Declined By More Than 12% In Three Years

 Expert: Central Bank Reserves Declined By More Than 12% In Three Years

economy | 11:23 - 05/16/2025   Mawazine News - Baghdad -  Economic affairs expert, Manar Al-Obaidi, confirmed today, Friday, that the Central Bank of Iraq's reserves witnessed a significant decline of more than 12% from the end of 2022 until March 2025.

Al-Obaidi said, in a statement received by Mawazine News, that "reserves declined by more than 20 trillion Iraqi dinars in a period of only 15 months, at a rate of 1.3 trillion dinars per month, equivalent to one billion dollars."

He added, "This decline cannot be read in isolation from the continuous rise in the import bill, which has begun to drain the state's hard currency resources on a daily basis."

Al-Obaidi pointed out that "this decline is due to Iraq's almost total dependence on foreign exchange to meet its consumer and production needs, in light of the absence of efficient local alternatives, the weakness of the industrial and agricultural sectors, and the continued operation of the currency window mechanism in its current form."  https://www.mawazin.net/Details.aspx?jimare=261491