IS IRAQ ABLE TO PREVENT DEALINGS IN DOLLARS TO RESTORE THE “PRESTIGE” OF THE DINAR? – URGENT, 30 AUGUST

 IS IRAQ ABLE TO PREVENT DEALINGS IN DOLLARS TO RESTORE THE “PRESTIGE” OF THE DINAR? – URGENT

On Saturday (August 26, 2023), the expert in economic affairs, Mustafa Akram Hantoush, confirmed the difficulty of canceling dealing in dollars, especially since Iraq imports everything in hard currency .

Hantoush told “Baghdad Today” that “the government’s tendency to sell cars in Iraqi dinars instead of US dollars is very difficult from a practical point of view, despite the government’s attempt to impose pledges on exhibition owners and carry out a massive arrest campaign. “

He added, “The decision is practically difficult to implement, since the car trade passes through a global market that deals in hard currency, because we do not have the possibility of manufacturing cars inside Iraq, and we only have the Mahmoudiya factory .”

He pointed out that “large quantities of cars are imported from abroad and in the currency of the dollar, and therefore they are priced in hard currency, and even if they are priced in dinars, this will be done on the basis of the last price of the dollar, and therefore the citizen will not benefit anything from the process of selling cars in dinars. “

And that “the central bank is trying to strengthen the currency by reducing access to the dollar by traders only .”

The government is trying to control the continuing rise in the exchange rate of the dollar against the Iraqi dinar in the market, about seven months after its official decision to raise the value of the Iraqi dinar at a price of 1320 per dollar .

The government had taken a decision last February to raise the value of the Iraqi dinar against the dollar, after its price at the end of 2020 reached 1,470 dinars per dollar. It was implemented by the previous government to bridge the deficit in expenditures and salaries due to the drop in oil prices in global markets .

The dollar is forbidden

The Ministry of the Interior prevented merchants and citizens from dealing in dollars in markets and shops, and restricted transactions to Iraqi dinars.

It seems that the security solution to the rise in the price of the dollar in the parallel market inside Iraq did not achieve any significant results, but rather complicated the economic scene and led in part to a rise in prices in the Iraqi markets.

Economic specialists point out that the market requires many measures to maintain the stability of the currency, most notably preventing smuggling.

BY DINAR IRAQ & DONG VIETNAM