For a country which depends so critically on trade exchanges with the rest of the World – external trade constitutes 69% of GDP – it was perhaps inevitable that the financing of trade flows would be the area where financial stress would first surface when international money-centre banks did not roll over long-established trade credit lines to domestic banks.
The Bank responded promptly by extending a Special Foreign Currency Line of Credit of $ million, i.e. nearly 7% of Bank reserves to ensure the continued financing of the country’s trade. This measure, taken in December 2008, extended the Bank’s toolkit and it was vital to keep the economy functioning smoothly in the unusual conditions prevailing at the time.