OREANDA-NEWS. August 12, 2009. At its meeting the Council of administration of the National Bank of Moldova decided to diminish the base rate applied on the main monetary policy operations of the National Bank by 1.0 percentage point, to the level of 7% per year, as well as the rate on overnight credits and the base rate on long-term credits by 1.0 percentage point, to the level of 9.5% and 7.0 % per year, respectively.

Simultaneously, the National Bank of Moldova has decided the reduction of the required reserves ratio in MDL by 4.0 percentage points and in free convertible currencies by 2.0 percentage points, and established it at the level of 10.0% and 12.0%, respectively, from the calculation base.

The continual liberalization of the monetary policy promoted by the National Bank of Moldova is due to the maintenance of a descendent trend of the inflation. Thus, from the beginning of the year the deflation registered 2.4%, while for the last 12 months it recorded 0.5%.

The nominated decisions of the Council of administration of the National Bank of Moldova will have as consequence the increase of the commercial banks’ liquidity by about 480 million lei, USD 11.4 million and EUR 12.6 million. Thus, the excess liquidity within the banking system will go up by about 2 billion lei, fact that will continue to influence the diminution of the base rate, as well as of the interest rates in the market and the enlargement of credit possibilities for the real sector of the economy.

The National Bank will carefully monitor the situation on the credit, foreign exchange and money market and will undertake adequate and necessary measures in order to ensure the achievement of its fundamental objective.