Thus, i)  The maximum amount to be purchased in daily foreign exchange buying auctions has been set as USD 45 million for 2007, with USD 15 million for auction amount and USD 30 million for optional selling amount,  ii)  Then, the auction amount has been raised to USD 40 million as of 25 July 2007 with an assumption that the capital inflow to Turkey will follow a strong trend due to the end of the election process and positive expectations for macroeconomic policies,  iii)  However, the auction amount has been lowered to USD 15 million as of 15 August 2007 due to the fact that the unfavorable developments in housing and credit markets in developing countries increased the volatilities in the Turkish markets as well as in other developing markets in the said period. iv)  The measures taken by central banks in order to alleviate the problems in housing and credit markets have relatively reduced the volatilities in these markets and increased the global risk appetite. Therefore, the maximum amount to be purchased in auctions has been set as USD 90 million with USD 30 million for auction amount and USD 60 million for optional selling amount from 9 October 2007 onwards. As of 14 December 2007, the total amount of foreign exchange purchased via auctions in 2007 is USD 9.5 billion and there has not been any direct intervention in the foreign exchange market.
BIS central bankers’ speeches  11  Figure 8 Sweden’s net external position and accumulated current accounts Percentage of GDP  80  80 Accumulated current accounts Net external position  60  60 Nominal net external position  40  40  20  20  0  0  -20  -20  -40  -40  -60  -60 75  77  79  81  83  85  87  89  91  93  95  97  99  01  03  05  07  09  Sources: Statistics Sweden and the Riksbank  If it is the case that Sweden has no particularly large net claim internationally then this will have some significance for the prospects for the real exchange rate. In theory, countries with a strong external position should in the long term experience appreciating real exchange rates, and vice versa. There is also empirical support for the link between the net position and real exchange rates when studying different countries. 24 With a net claim close to zero one would not necessarily expect any strengthening of the real exchange rate despite a large current account surplus. The fact that Sweden’s external position appears to be close to zero suggests that there is no need for the real exchange rate for the krona to move in any particular direction for this reason. Other factors also affect the real exchange rate, for example relative GDP growth, relative inflation and the terms of trade.