September 27 (SeeNews) - The Romanian leu closed almost flat versus the euro on Thursday, unaffected by the central bank's decision to maintain its monetary policy rate unchanged, dealers said.
The local currency closed at 4.5154/5204 per euro compared to 4.5160/4.5180 on Wednesday.
"The leu traded between an intraday high of 4.5075/5125 and an intraday low of 4.5204/5254 per euro," a local dealer told SeeNews.
The country's central bank decided to keep its key interest rate at 5.25% earlier on Thursday. The dealer said the decision was in line with market expectations and had no impact on the local currency.
"We foresee the euro/Romanian leu at 4.55 in December and see risks coming from the political environment," BCR Research said in a note.
Romania's central bank, BNR, set its reference exchange rate at 4.5140 lei per euro on Thursday, compared to 4.5168 lei on Tuesday. For the U.S. dollar, BNR set the reference exchange rate at 3.5131 lei versus 3.5079 lei on Wednesday.
Turnover on the Romanian interbank leu deposit market fell to 1.2 billion lei on Wednesday from 1.5 billion lei on Tuesday. The central bank will issue Thursday's turnover figure on Friday.
Interest rates on overnight leu deposits decreased to 4.59%/5.09% on Thursday from 4.63%/5.13% on Wednesday.