Georgia’s Finance Ministry Expects Lari to Strengthen in Short Term
TBILISI – Georgia’s Finance Minister Nodar Khaduri said Monday he expects the national currency, the lari, to strengthen in the short term.
"You can see that the local currencies in the region are beginning to strengthen as oil prices have somewhat stabilized. This has resulted in a slight relief of pressure on the central bank to continually revise the lari’s exchange rate,” Khaduri said.
He also stressed that Georgia fragile market situation is not immune to the worsening economic conditions in neighboring Russia and Azerbaijan, both of whom have seen their national currencies crater by more than half of their value over the last year on the back of Western sanctions levied on Moscow for its invasion of Ukraine and low global energy prices.
The Russian ruble and Azeri manat were recently ranked by Forbes and FX Trader magazine as two of the world’s worst performing currencies over the last 12 months.
The Georgian lari has lost 45 per cent of its value against the US dollar since March 2014.
(2.461 GEL = $1 as of 16:09, 7 March 2016)