The Lebanese Central Bank’s balance sheet conveys some $350.54 million contraction in its foreign assets portfolio during the first half of March 2021 to $22.54 billion, down from $22.89 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 $17.51 billion by mid-March. Similarly, gold reserves at BDL fell by 1.92% ($312.73 million) in the first half of March to $15.94 billion as gold prices dipped to a ten-month low, with the sizeable rise in U.S. government bond yields, following bullish employment data, obscuring demand for the metal.

On an annual basis, BDL’s foreign assets came in 36.95% ($13.21 billion) lower than the $35.75 billion reading reported at end Mid-March 2020. Conversely, the value of gold reserves soared by 9.22% ($1.35 billion) when benchmarked to the $14.60 billion figure recorded in the same period last year. It is worth noting that BDL’s total reserves (foreign currency and gold) cover some 191 months of debt service and constitute around 35.00% and 39.10% of Lebanon’s gross and net public debt on a respective basis.

In a related note, BDL’s balance sheet widened by $0.57 billion during the first half of March to $151.58 billion owing to the 2.10% ($1.19 billion) increase in the value of other assets representing capitalized open market operations and seigniorage to $58.00 billion and the 0.17% rise in the value of securities portfolio to $40.69 billion, which altogether outweighed the 1.53% drop in the value of foreign assets to $22.54 billion and the 1.92% decrease in the value of gold reserves to $15.94 billion.

The share of BDL’s foreign assets of the latter’s total assets fell to 14.87% by mid-March 2021, compared to 15.16% by end of February, with the share of gold reserves also dropping to 10.52% from 10.76% two weeks earlier.