As Poslovni Dnevnik/Ana Blaskovic writes, for the second time this year, the Croatian National Bank has needed to intervene in the foreign exchange market to correct the exchange rate of the domestic currency (kuna) against the euro.
The central bank bought 120 million euros from commercial banks on Wednesday at an average exchange rate of 7.497346, pumping 900 million kuna back into the Croatian financial system.
Although there were no significant slips to speak of in the market before, the supply of the banking sector slightly pulled the exchange rate from 7,488 down to 7,485, but after a continuous appreciation in the previous month, the Croatian National Bank, as the regulator, decided to intervene and make the move.
While the second intervention this year resulted in the ”printing” of Croatian kuna, when the previous such intervention took place back in April, the Croatian National Bank made a withdrawal from the system. With the sale of 190 million euros to banks, around 1.44 billion kuna in total was withdrawn, which stabilised the exchange rate back then at the level of 7.570405 kuna.
On Thursday, the middle exchange rate of the euro on the exchange rate list of the Croatian National Bank (which has been applied since Friday) reached 7.484807 kuna. When we last saw these levels, it was mid-August last year at the very peak of the tourist season, which ended very abruptly shortly after when Croatia unfortunately ende up being placed on the red lists of most countries from which the tourists were typically arriving here from.
This year, a better yet still wobbly summer season is expected than last year, and with it the inflow of euros, which will, as every year at that time, push the kuna exchange rate down. It should be noted that by joining the exchange rate mechanism, Croatia undertook to keep the exchange rate in the range of +/- 15 percent around the central parity of 7.53450.
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