The Lebanese Central Bank’s balance sheet conveys some $394.06 million contraction in its foreign assets portfolio during the second half of January 2022 to $17.32 billion, down from $17.71 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 $12.29 billion by end of January. Similarly, the value of gold reserves at BDL dropped by 1.83% ($307.01 million) in the second half of January to $16.51 billion as gold prices decreased amid the US Federal Reserve’s intention to increase interest rates.

On an annual basis, BDL’s foreign assets came in 26.20% ($6.15 billion) lower than the $23.47 billion reading reported as at end of January 2021. In addition, the value of gold reserves came in 3.21% ($0.55 billion) when benchmarked to the $17.06 billion figure recorded in the same period in 2021. It is worth noting that BDL’s total reserves (foreign currency and gold) cover some 179 months of debt service and constitute around 28.86% and 32.83% of Lebanon’s gross and net public debt on a respective basis.

In a related note, BDL’s balance sheet narrowed by $2.14 billion during the second half of January 2022 to $161.86 billion on the back of the 2.06% ($1.53 billion) contraction in the value of other assets (representing capitalized open market operations and seigniorage) to $72.68 billion, the 2.22% drop in the value of foreign assets to $17.32 billion, and the 1.83% decrease in the value of gold reserves to $16.51 billion, which altogether outweighed the 0.20% expansion in the value of the securities portfolio to $41.43 billion.

The share of BDL’s foreign assets of the latter’s total assets decreased to 10.70% as at end of January 2022, compared to 10.80% at mid-January, with the share of gold reserves concurrently dropping to 10.20% from 10.25% two weeks earlier. The share of other assets reached 44.90% of BDL’s total balance sheet by end of January 2022, down from 45.25% at mid-January.