Situation Remains Uncertain with Manat

On Saturday and Sunday the rumors about the future of the manat were more than real information. After the collapse of the exchange rate by 33%, none of the officials spoke or gave explanations.

Against this background, the government media began to spread rumors that on Monday the head of state will overturn the decision to reduce the rate of manat and people froze in anticipation of this speech. But more pragmatic ones rushed to working stores.

It was not difficult to notice that the prices of products grew a little and not everywhere. Basically, it's imported goods. All of them were brought before the collapse of the course, but the sellers are already preparing to increase by 20-30%.

Some grocery stores automatically apply a 20 percent mark-up on local goods and 34 percent on imports. The prices for vegetables and fruits did not change.

Some pharmacies arranged a 15 percent surcharge on hygiene and basic necessities and 35 percent - on medicines. In this case, they referred to the decision of suppliers.

The tensest situation is with appliances, which are fully imported. Large stores have stopped selling and are doing reassessment.

Most of exchange offices from Monday morning do not work, and the sellers say they wait for instructions. However, prices for buying and selling are already new. However, buying a currency for some reason is at the old price - 80 gapik, and the sales price is 1.06 or higher. That is, the difference in buying and selling is almost 30%!

From a number of regions of the country information is received about the mass protests of the population due to the rise in price. Sources on the spot report a rise in price of food and imported goods.

On Saturday and Sunday the largest shopping centers of the capital, Bina and Sadarak that trade almost exclusively imports did not operate. Sellers have stated the impossibility of trade and raising prices. Against this background, many shops closed.

The biggest concern is expressed by people with bank loans and deposits. Authorities have not reported how investors will return dollar-denominated loans, which automatically increased by 33%.

The situation is not clear also with the payment of interest on deposits, because banks have not yet given any guarantees that they can fulfill their obligation to pay 9-12% of the deposits. -02D-