DUSHANBE, April 27, 2010, Asia-Plus  -- Tajikistan’s gold and currency reserves rose 9.8 percent in three months to March 31, 2010, reaching 385.8 million U.S. dollars, Sharif Rahimzoda, the head of the National Bank of Tajikistan (NBT), told reporters in Dushanbe on April 26.

According to him, the currency reserves have risen 40 percent over the report period through the purchase of foreign currency.  “Since the beginning of the year, we have purchased 70 million U.S. dollars in circulation,” Rahimzoda said.

He noted that the Tajik national currency, the somoni, has risen 0.09 percent against the dollar over the first quarter of this year and as of April 26, an official exchange rate of the dollar against the somoni was 1:4.3678.

“Monetary aggregates rose 33.8 percent in the year to March 31, 2010, reaching 2.2 billion somoni,” said Tajik central bank head, “Of this amount, 1.9 billion somoni are in circulation.”

He added that “Tajik banks have shown sustainability over the report period and attracted 57 million U.S. dollars from abroad, which is 80 percent more than in the same period last year.”

Rahimzoda noted that the country’s banking system now consisted of 137 credit organizations, including 14 banks and 123 non-bank financial institutions.

294 million U.S. dollars have been remitted to banks in Tajikistan in January-March 2010, which is 5.6 percent more than in the same period of 2009 and some 33 percent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) for the report period.