The Central Bank announced yesterday afternoon a unification of the exchange market, with the peso-dollar rate allowed to float according to supply and demand. According to the plan, all dollar operations would be transacted in the open market, in compliance with the government’s promise to the IMF to adopt such a procedure by year’s end. Those generating hard currencies will no longer be obliged to exchange their dollars at the Central Bank, but the government needs to buy dollars for its foreign service, military purchases, foreign debt and petroleum imports on the open market.
El Caribe interprets the unexpected announcement as a concession made for the benefit of the IMF and to encourage them to return to the agreement that was suspended after the government took on new debt for the Union Fenosa deal. This deal at the present time had not figured into the original IMF accord, by which the government would receive US$1 billion from the IMF and multilateral organizations, based on the fulfillment of the terms set out. So far, the government has received only an initial disbursement of US$110 million.