Bangladesh Bank has set the ceiling on stock of taka foreign exchange dealers can keep at any point of time.
The stock must not exceed Tk 5.0 million, the central bank said in a notice on Thursday.
The money changers will have to deposit Bangladeshi taka beyond this limit to their current deposit account, according to bdnews24.com.
The Bangladesh Bank said the maximum stock of cash foreign currency must not exceed $25,000 or equivalent at the close of each business day.
Cash foreign currency beyond this limit shall either be encashed with any bank or deposited to the foreign currency account of the money changer.
Cash foreign currency can be withdrawn from this account. The balance of that account must not exceed $50,000 or equivalent at any point of time.
Helal Shikder, general secretary of Money Changers Association of Bangladesh, said the ceiling on the stock of cash foreign currency was already there while the cap on the stock of cash taka was new. “We had asked the Bangladesh Bank to raise it [cap on stock of foreign currency] to $100,000.”
The central bank announced the decisions amid a shortage of US dollars that forced the government to put curbs on imports as rising import costs piled pressure on the foreign currency reserves.
Expatriates who return home are the main source of dollars for money changers. Currently, Bangladesh has 235 licensed money changers. Hundreds of other firms also trade in foreign currency without a licence.
The central bank in a recent drive suspended the licences of around a dozen money changers over irregularities.
In the open market, the price of the dollar was Tk 113-114.