Repayment Of Funds Main Cause For Rupee Depreciation: Official

NEW DELHI: Repayment of funds, which were raised from overseas market in 2013, has been the main reason for rupee depreciation in the past few months, a senior Finance Ministry official said on Tuesday. However, the official maintained that there has been a "zero depreciation" of the currency in the last 5-years between 2013 and 2018. "In 2013, about $32-34 billion were raised by the government that appreciated the Indian rupee," the senior official said here adding that "the currency exchange rate between the US dollar and the rupee pair is the same in 2018 as it was in 2013."

"In the last 5-years, the rupee has remained stable against all major currencies like euro and pound, though vis-a-vis the US dollar there has been some depreciation due to the strengthening of the USD."

"We are the only country among the emerging market economies, whose currency has maintained a stable value in the long term."

In recent days, factors such as geo-political developments, wider trade deficit, along with outflow of foreign funds have pulled the rupee to fresh record intra-day and closing lows.

On August 16, the rupee had plunged to an intra-day low level of 70.39-40 -- its lowest ever mark -- against the greenback prompting automobile manufacturers and other import dependent sectors to raise prices.

It settled at a record closing low of 70.16 against the US dollar on August 16.

However, on easing of global trade tensions, the rupee appreciated by 2 paise on Tuesday to settle at 69.81 per US dollar, from 69.83 on the previous trade session.

On the country's foreign reserves position, the official said: "We are in a comfortable position as far as the forex reserves are concerned."

Recently, the country's foreign reserves as handled by the Reserve Bank of India declined by over $1.80 billion during the week ended August 10 to $400.88 billion from $402.70 billion reported for the week ended August 3.

Analysts attributed the decline in Forex reserves to RBI's intervention to stem the decline in rupee's fall. The RBI is known to enter the markets via intermediaries to either sell or buy US dollars to keep the rupee in a stable orbit.