The Lebanese Central Bank’s balance sheet conveys some $115.31 million contraction in its foreign assets portfolio during the first half of January 2022 to $17.71 billion, down from $17.83 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 $12.68 billion by mid-January. On the other hand, the value of gold reserves at BDL rose by 1.33% ($221.43 million) in the first half of January to $16.82 billion as gold prices increased driven by safe-haven demand amid fears over the omicron variant and rising inflation.

On an annual basis, BDL’s foreign assets came in 25.36% ($6.02 billion) lower than the $23.73 billion reading reported as at mid-January 2021. In addition, the value of gold reserves fell by 1.68% ($0.29 billion) when benchmarked to the $17.11 billion figure recorded in the same period in 2021. It is worth noting that BDL’s total reserves (foreign currency and gold) cover some 183 months of debt service and constitute around 29.73% and 33.65% of Lebanon’s gross and net public debt on a respective basis.

In a related note, BDL’s balance sheet widened by $0.81 billion during the first half of January 2022 to $164.01 billion on the back of the 1.33% increase in the value of gold reserves to $16.82 billion, the 0.98% ($0.72 billion) rise in the value of other assets (representing capitalized open market operations and seigniorage) to $74.21 billion and the 0.19% expansion in the value of the securities portfolio to $41.35 billion which altogether outweighed the 0.65% drop in the value of foreign assets to $17.71 billion.

The share of BDL’s foreign assets of the latter’s total assets decreased to 10.80% as at mid-January 2022, compared to 10.92% at end of December, while the share of gold reserves increased to 10.25% from 10.17% two weeks earlier. The share of other assets reached 45.25% of BDL’s total balance sheet by mid-January 2022, up from 45.03% at end of year 2021.