The Open Market Operations Committee of the Central Bank of Jordan (CBJ) on Thursday decided to keep interest rates on monetary policy instruments unchanged during its 6th meeting in 2023. The CBJ stressed the bank’s commitment to closely follow up developments related to the national economy’s performance, along with global economic developments, and the monetary policy directions of central banks, internationally and regionally, to address inflationary pressures. During its meeting, the committee affirmed its confidence in the national economy’s performance as revealed by the latest available economic data, led by the CBJ’s foreign reserves, which reached a level of $17.5 billion that is sufficient to cover the Kingdom’s imports of goods and services for 7.7 months. The data also showed increase in deposits in Jordan’s banks on an annual basis by JD1.6 billion during July 2023, with a growth of 4.0% reaching JD42.8 billion. Moreover, credit facilities granted by banks increased on an annual basis by JD1.5 billion with a growth of 4.7%, bringing their balance to JD33.4 billion, meanwhile, the latest financial solidity indicators affirms strength and resilience of the Jordanian banking system, the figures showed. Likewise, foreign sector indicators witnessed a “significant” improvement in their performance, as tourism income recorded an increase of 41.3% during the first eight months of 2023 to reach JD3.65 billion, while national commodity exports increased by 2.3% during the first half of 2023 to reach JD4.2 billion. At the same time, the total volume of foreign direct investment (FDI) into the Kingdom increased by 20.9% during the first half of 2023 to reach JD550 million, while the latest statistics indicate that the national economy recorded a growth of 2.8% during the first quarter of 2023. Additionally, local inflation rate dropped to 2.5% during the first eight months of 2023, which is also forecast to go down from this level until end of 2023, compared to its corresponding rate of 4.2% during 2022.
Source: Jordan News Agency
