Saturday
20th Apr 2024
Dhivehi Edition
The gross international reserve of Maldives has dropped significantly.
Maldives’ central bank, Maldives Monetary Authority (MMA) reported that the national USD reserve held a total of USD 499.6 million at the end of October, of which only USD 105 is usable.
This translates, roughly, to the funding required for a single month’s import goods.
The state had not seen such a decline in USD reserves even during Covid-19 pandemic. Moreover, it had not seen such a drastic and dramatic decline since the beginning of the year.
At the beginning of the year, the available reserve held USD 371 million and has seen a steady decline each month. By the end of September, USD 194 million was available in the USD reserve, however, within the month of October, it had plummeted by USD 85 million.
One of the largest investment banks of the world, J.P. Morgan has estimated complete depletion of the Maldivian national reserve by 2023, pushing Maldives into a sovereign default. Furthermore, CEO of the national bank, Bank of Maldives had also foretold the likeliness of Maldives being submerged in a situation resembling the Srilankan financial crisis.