Forex Exchange Market –Central Bank of Kenya CBK has barred local money remittance companies from selling over $100,000 per day to individuals.
According to Reuters report seen by this Homenews.Co.ke, Kenya’s CBK has limited the sale of dollars to individuals in its bid to save the deteriorating dollar.
This meaning that only such amounts and above will only be accessible to commercial banks dealing in Firex.
This measure having been triggered by the fact that CBK realized that remittance companies are participating in wholesale Forex exchange without following set guidelines.
In Kenya, there are listed about eleven remittance firms fully regulated to operate in Forex, locally,
Sadly, Individuals running big businesses will now be forced to use the new channels(banks) to raise dollars and not money remittance firms – a move that will definitely affect their operations.
This firms, for many years, have been providing remittance services to the diaspora community sending money at home.
Recent financial data fetched from the regulator CBK indicated that diaspora remittances increased in March 2023 to sh 48.1 billion from sh 41.7 billion.
This being among the main sources of dollar for Kenya and which is reported to have been growing faster as compared to neighbouring nations.
The new directives from the CBK coming at the time local shilling had deteriorated in its value because of both inflation and demand from the manufacturing industry.
