October 16 (SeeNews) - Albania's central bank injected 233.59 billion leks ($2.536 billion/1.702 billion euro) in the second quarter of the year, mostly through one-week repo deals, the bank said.
During the second quarter the Bank of Albania injected an average 16.68 billion leks a week in one-week reverse repo deals and an average 2.4 billion leks per auction in three-month reverse repo deals, it said in a statement late on Thursday.
The bank, which usually regulates daily liquidity through one-day deposits, temporarily suspended acceptance of one-day deposits by banks for two months and resumed it in June when it used 0.14 billion leks on average to regulate daily liquidity, compared to 1.04 billion leks in the first quarter.
This raised awareness among the banks to better administer liquidity, the central bank said.
The Bank of Albania did not use one-day credits to regulate liquidity over the three-month period through June.
It sold 1.93 billion leks to regulate the foreign exchange market and avoid a depreciation of the local currency over the second quarter. The bank also bought 5.867 billion leks from the Finance Ministry and sold it foreign currency worth 6.988 billion leks in the second quarter. It also sold 83.53 million leks in foreign currency to international financial institutions.
The bank injected 163.84 billion leks mostly through one-week repo deals in the first quarter of the year.
(1 euro = 137.2348 Albanian leks)