The two financial institutions whose operating licences
have been suspended by the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) over alleged illegal
foreign currency dealings, were reportedly behind the sudden and drastic fall
of the Zimbabwe dollar exchange rate in the last few days.
After the Zimbabwe dollar exchange rate against the United
States dollar appeared to steadily strengthen since the 21 day lockdown started
over a week ago, particularly on the parallel market, the exchange rate
suddenly started rising again, inexplicably, over the last few days.
The RBZ had fixed the rate at 25 to the greenback just
before President Mnangagwa announced the lockdown to contain the spread of
Covid-19, as part of broad measures to ensure certainty of pricing, make
transating easier and minimise the deadly impact of the pandemic.
Alert Reserve Bank officials noted the suspicious rate
movement lately and traced it to illegal forex buying by Cash Twenty-Four and
Crediconnect, which are licensed bureau de change and credit only microfinance
entities, respectively,
prompting authorities to suspend their licences.
“The suspension of the institutions’ operating licences is
with immediate effect, pending further investigations. If found guilty, the
institutions will be liable to further regulatory action, which could result in
cancellation of licence and / or criminal prosecution,” RBZ Governor Dr John
Mangudya said in a statement on Friday.
He said the bank was in possession of information showing
that the two institutions have been engaging in illicit foreign currency
transactions, which have been adversely affecting the economy.
As such, highly placed central bank sources further
confirmed that the bank had proved that the two financial institutions were
behind a hard currency buying spree that has been pushing the exchange rate up
of late, possibly explaining the recent dramatic increase in the prices of
basic goods.
The bank has also reportedly managed to identify registered
entities on whose behalf the two financial institutions were buying the foreign
currency in a manner that had serious negative impact on the domestic currency.
Due to the acute shortage of foreign currency and the
limited access on the formal interbank forex market, in an imports dependent
Zimbabwe, a good number of businesses, registered and informal, depend on the
parallel market to get forex.
The parallel market exchange rate between the Zimbabwe
dollar and US dollar has creeped up from as low as 33 last week to a high of 44
by Thursday, pushing prices up in its wake at a time the majority have either
no income at all or are unable to work because of the ongoing lockdown.
This comes amid strong concerns from authorities over the
spate of wanton price increases during the period of the national emergency due
to Covid-19, amid fears of predatory pricing in times of a pandemic, which has
killed tens od thousands and infected hundreds of thousands others. Herald
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