The tumbling Indian rupee is leading to huge money transfers by Qatar-based Indian expatriates home, foreign exchange operators say.
The rupee touched an all-time low of 16.55 against the dollar-pegged Qatari riyal last morning, improving later in day trading to between 16.40 and 16.49.
News reports from India said the currency breached the barrier of `60 a dollar yesterday to reach `60.72, due to heavy capital inflows and month-end dollar demand from importers.
The abrupt slide in the currency continues as overseas funds pull out of emerging markets, said media reports. An Eastern Exchange official here said the rupee-riyal rate last morning was `16.55, which improved slightly to `16.49 by evening.
The Indian rupee has fallen 10.8 percent in 2013, becoming the worst performing currency of a major Asian nation, according to media reports. The basic problem India faces is that its imports are growing more than its exports, so the current account deficit is increasing.
A Qatar-UAE Exchange statement yesterday said the Indian currency’s slide was certainly not good news for its economy but had a silver lining for millions of Indians living overseas.
“A tumbling rupee means more money reaching back home (India),” the Qatar-UAE Exchange statement said.
“The all-time low Indian rupee has spiked the remittance volume to India, which is the largest receiver of remittances in the world,” the exchange house’s global operations vice-president, Promoth Manghat, was quoted as saying.
The rupee will continue to be under pressure for some time to come and in the current scenario it is too difficult to predict its future, Manghat said.
But Indians living abroad are choosing to look at the brighter side of the current economic situation in their country, he added. As it is, India remains one of the top recipients of expatriate-routed remittances from Qatar.
Meanwhile, the currency situation as regards Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Nepal is also not encouraging. The Sri Lankan rupee depreciated to 35.77 against the Qatari riyal yesterday from 35.51 the previous day.
An exchange official not wanting his name in print said Sri Lanka had been waiting for a loan from China and once the loan materialises, the rupee would appreciate.
The Nepalese rupee improved marginally to 26.38 against the riyal yesterday, while the Pakistani rupee was quoted at 27.12 against the riyal.
http://thepeninsulaqatar.com/qatar/243100-expats-cash-in-on-rupee%E2%80%99s-record-fall.html
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