Dollar, Drama & Deals 🤝

Welcome to this week’s edition of ፍራንክ Digest!

Your weekly brief on all things Finance and Investing. Quick, enjoyable reads for busy professionals in 5 minutes or less.

Topics this week:

• ⚡ BUZZ: ዶላር በጨረታ - NBE’s Fire Sale

• 💸 Floating the Birr: Lessons From Argentina & Türkiye

• 🛖 Asset Backed Securities (ABS)

• 🗝️ The Key Takeaways

Thanks for reading!

BUZZ: The Dollar Injection: Banks Turn Into Buyers In A 2 Hour Selling Spree

When was the last time you were at a Dollar auction?

Where suits and ties bid for the finest USD notes!

Well that’s what happened on the 7th of August between 10 AM and noon, when the NBE invited banks (27 banks attended) in a sell off event of a significant amount of US dollars that the regulatory institution was keeping as a nest egg.

By the end, as the shouting subsided (we suppose they ran out of breath!), the NBE announced that it sold US Dollars at an average exchange rate of 107.9 Birr to the Dollar.

Although our dramatic description of the events that unfolded may be imaginative (as we were not invited to the party 🎉), it is understood that NBE made a formal approach to the financial institutions to submit bids to acquire a set number of dollars.