The Lebanese Central Bank’s balance sheet conveys some $218.10 million contraction in its foreign assets portfolio during the second half of August 2021 to $19.57 billion, down from $19.79 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 $14.54 billion by end of August. On the other hnad, the value of gold reserves at BDL increased by 3.32% ($537.57 million) in the second half of August to $16.73 billion with gold prices rising due to the recent turmoil in Afghanistan.

On an annual basis, BDL’s foreign assets came in 31.24% ($8.89 billion) lower than the $28.46 billion reading reported at end August 2020. Moreover, the value of gold reserves dropped by 7.67% ($1.39 billion) when benchmarked to the $18.12 billion figure recorded in the same period last year. It is worth noting that BDL’s total reserves (foreign currency and gold) cover some 182 months of debt service and constitute around 31.99% and 35.99% of Lebanon’s gross and net public debt on a respective basis.

In a related note, BDL’s balance sheet increased by $1.38 billion during the second half of August to $159.76 billion on the back of the 1.45% ($0.98 billion) rise in the value of other assets (representing capitalized open market operations and seigniorage) to $68.56 billion coupled with the 3.32% increase in the value of gold reserves to $16.73 billion and the 0.19% appreciation in the value of the securities portfolio to $40.72 billion which outweighed the 1.10% contraction in the value of foreign assets to $19.57 billion.

The share of BDL’s foreign assets of the latter’s total assets fell to 12.25% by end of August 2021, compared to 12.50% by mid-August, with the share of gold reserves rising to 10.47% from 10.23% two weeks earlier. The share of other assets continued its upturn reaching 42.91% of BDL’s total balance sheet.