The Lebanese Central Bank’s balance sheet conveys some $559.43 million contraction in its foreign assets portfolio during the first half of April 2020 to $34.68 billion, down from $35.23 billion a fortnight earlier. When factoring out BDL’s portfolio of Lebanese Eurobonds amounting to $5.03 billion as per the disclosure made by the Central Bank, the latter’s foreign currency reserves would settle at $29.65 billion by Mid-April. From another standpoint, the value of gold reserves at BDL increased by 6.58% ($974.99 million) in the first half of April to $15.80 billion as gold prices soared to a seven-year high propelled by safe-haven demand amid global recessionary fears.

On an annual basis, BDL’s foreign assets came in 9.29% ($3.93 billion) lower than the $38.23 billion reading reported at Mid-April 2019. Conversely, the value of gold reserves soared by 33.11% ($3.93 billion) when benchmarked to the $11.87 billion figure recorded in the same period last year. It is worth noting that BDL’s total reserves (foreign currency and gold) cover some 98 months of debt service and constitute around 49.39% and 55.59% of Lebanon’s gross and net public debt on a respective basis.

In a related note, BDL’s balance sheet widened by $1.45 billion during the first half of April to $147.73 billion owing to some 2.43% ($1.04 billion) expansion in the value of other assets to $43.83 billion representing open market operations and seigniorage costs, coupled with a 0.15% appreciation in the value of the securities portfolio to $38.41 billion and a 6.58% increase in the value of gold reserves to $15.80 billion which altogether outweighed the 1.59% drop in foreign assets to $34.68 billion and the 0.42% contraction in the value of loans to the local financial sector to $14.76 billion.

The share of BDL’s foreign assets of the latter’s total assets dropped to 23.47% by Mid-April 2020, compared to 24.09% by end of March, while that of gold reserves increased to 10.69% from 10.13% two weeks earlier.