The National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE) has announced yet another change to its gold purchase price following the liberalization of the country’s foreign exchange market.
The central bank has done away entirely with incentives it had previously introduced in an effort to salvage rapidly declining gold supply.
The NBE is now offering the birr equivalent of international gold prices at the day’s exchange rate, which is calculated as an average of rates offered at commercial banks.
The central bank first introduced a five percent incentive on gold purchases several years ago, before the figure was upped to 35 percent and then 65 percent more recently under the watch of Governor Mamo Mihretu.
Although the NBE is the only authorized buyer of gold in the country, a flourishing contraband trade has seen its supply dry up in recent years as artisanal and commercial miners opt to trade via a significantly more lucrative illicit market.
