BB hopes IMF to approve second tranche loan in December

Bangladesh Bank (BB) hopes that the second tranche of the $470 crore IMF loan, which amounts to $681 million, will come in December.

The second installment of the loan will be approved by the international money lender during its board meeting on 11 December.

BB Spokesperson Mezbaul Haque disclosed this at a press briefing after a meeting with the visiting review team from the IMF at the central bank headquarters in the city on Thursday (October 19).

He informed that Bangladesh has already met several conditions set by the IMF.

Following the meeting, Mezbaul Haque said the IMF team was satisfied with Bangladesh’s attempts at structural reform and added that he expected the second tranche of the loans in December.

Of the six conditions set out by the IMF for the loan, Bangladesh has been able to fulfill four. The IMF is not adding any further conditions to the second tranche.

These conditions included a single exchange rate based on the market, modernisation of monetary policy, information disclosure on risk-based assets, IMF measures on the foreign exchange accounts and raising them to a certain level, and market-based tax revenue collection and interest rates, Haque said.