Al-Nusairi: Explains the new mechanism for external transfers after closing the platform, 10 jan

 Al-Nusairi: Explains the new mechanism for external transfers after closing the platform

Economic and banking adviser Samir Al-Nusairi explained that the closure of the electronic platform on 31/12/2024, which was used in the Central Bank to pre-examine and control the transparency of foreign transfers, ensure its access to the final beneficiary and overcome suspicions of money laundering and terrorist financing, is not as some believe that the closure of the platform is a closure of external transfers while it is a change in mechanisms to achieve fluidity and speed by reducing loops.

Al-Nusairi said in a televised interview that it is not normal for the Central Bank or the US Federal Bank to practice executive procedural operations, but the task of central banks is supervision and control. The electronic platform was a stage in this direction, and now we have reached the stage practiced in the countries of the world in accordance with international banking standards through the direct relationship between local banks and correspondent banks.

He added that transfers in other currencies will enable Iraqi banks that do not have correspondents in American banks to make transfers through correspondent banks in other countries such as China, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, India, Europe, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. This will lead to expanding the number of Iraqi banks participating in foreign transfers and reduce pressure on other banks.

He stresed that the exchange rate announced as the parallel rate does not express a price fact, firstly, because Iraq does not apply to the situation of the parallel market, which is achieved only when it has sources of dollars and currencies other than the Central Bank, such as private sector exports, transfers, residents abroad, tourism and others, so it has exchange rates that correspond to the official exchange rate of the central bank, and that speculating in dollars on the black market is accounted by law. 

Second, the limitation of the sale of the cash dollar for travelers and with a tight mechanism made the sales of the cash dollar at the lowest level, so the circulating of it is what is what is left for travelers, and we should look at the price in which the central bank covers. 

All foreign operations of imports and personal transfers for study and treatment abroad are legitimate purposes, which explains the stability of prices by the current inflation rate, which is by 3.1% below the inflation rates in the Arab, regional and neighboring countries. 

This means that the Central Bank has achieved a basic objective of monetary policy.

Al-Nusiri was surprised that some calculate the revenues of banks from the sale of dollars by measuring the difference between the market price and the official price, which is a big mistake because banks do not transfer at the market price but at the official price monitored by the Central Bank, indicating that the foreign currency sale window is dedicated to secure the Iraqi dinar for the purposes of the operational budget of the Ministry of Finance and to finance banks’ balances in foreign currencies for external transfers and the coverage of the cash dollar for travelers and other legitimate needs of citizens.