The Lebanese Central Bank governor Mr. Riad Salameh held a televised press conference on Wednesday during which he tackled a series of accusations that were recently directed towards BDL and its policies. At first, the BDL governor refuted recent claims of lack of transparency, clarifying that it publishes its balance sheet on a bi-weekly basis and that its accounts are available in the official gazette. Moreover on this issue, Mr. Salameh pointed out that the Central Bank’s accounts are audited by two renowned international companies and that said accounts are in line with international standards and with those of other central banks. In this vein, Mr. Salameh declared that the Central Bank’s liquidity exceeded $20 billion as of April 24, after deducting some $1.7 billion in payments for the import of raw materials and fuel. As far as the financial engineering schemes are concerned, Mr. Salameh clarified that such engineering schemes were essential to secure U.S. Dollars for the dollarized Lebanese economy, and to buy some time for the government to start implementing the much needed reforms to unlock CEDRE funds, a thing which failed to materialize. Always in the same vein, the governor pointed out that Lebanon suffers from a twin deficit problem, a current account deficit and a budget deficit, aggregating to $81 billion over the last five years, implying annual financing needs of around $16.2 billion to ensure the stability of the Lebanese economy. Mr. Salameh declared that the Central Bank has always financed the Lebanese government, frequently at rates much lower than market rates, yet clarified in this regard that the Central Bank is not responsible for the government’s way of spending said funds. Apart from lending the government at below market rates, the Central Bank governor added that BDL reduced the government’s debt during the Paris 2 conference and that it has also previously used the revaluation of gold reserves to trim the public debt. In response to the accusations of some $5.9 billion in money transferred abroad during the first two months of 2020, Mr. Salameh highlighted that some $3.7 billion were used by customers to settle loans from their deposit accounts with the remaining $2.2 billion being in the form of cash withdrawals. Mr. Salameh added that the Central Bank it will do its best efforts to prevent the bankruptcy of banks, in order to protect deposits, and that the Central Bank requested banks to raise their capital by 20% by June 2020. The Central Bank governor commented that there is no need for a haircut on deposits, and that talks on such a haircut is worrisome for depositors and accordingly hurts the image of the banking sector.  Mr. Salameh also defended the exchange rate peg explaining that the stability of the peg helps tame inflation and serves the best interests of the Lebanese population. Finally, Mr. Salameh stressed on the independency of the Central Bank as per the provisions of the Code of Money and Commerce and commented that it will pursue its cooperation with the Lebanese government.