Artist Steve Wasterval takes a photo of a mini-painting before hiding it in the Greenpoint district of the New York borough of Brooklyn on May 25. AFP
The National Bank of Cambodia (NBC) announced on Tuesday that it will continue to strengthen confidence in the riel by stabilising the currency exchange rate and boosting public awareness on the economic benefits of using the local currency.
As Cambodia has a high dollar economy, the NBC has limited options when it comes to its monetary policy.
So far, its main strategy has been to stabilise the currency exchange rate by using riel to purchase the US dollar. Last year the NBC injected an equivalent of $915 million into the economy to buy US dollars with the local currency.
An NBC report last year said the central bank purchased US dollars 125 times on an average exchange rate of 4,050 riel to $1. Fifty-four per cent of the additional riel in circulation has been absorbed by commercial banks, and the rest went to money changers.
