NAIROBI (Reuters) – Kenya’s shilling lost ground on Friday to touch a new all-time low due to increased dollar demand, especially from the oil companies, traders said.
At 0736 GMT, commercial banks quoted the shilling at 118.20/30 per dollar, compared with Thursday’s close of 118.10/30.
Earlier in the session, the shilling touched a new all-time low of 118.35/55, according to Refinitiv data.
“We are seeing quite some demand from the energy sector; oil, petroleum companies, so the kind of demand they have is still out-matching supply.
The supply side remains subdued,” a foreign exchange trader at one commercial bank said.
Fuel accounts for a fifth of Kenya’s import bill, according to the finance ministry. Traders say it is one of the major contributing factors to the weaker shilling, which has broken through a series of record lows against the dollar this year.
On Thursday, President Uhuru Kenyatta’s office said he had authorised the release of 16.7 billion shillings ($141 million) in fuel subsidies, keeping the maximum price caps for diesel, petrol and kerosene unchanged for the next month to mid-August.
………………………Shilling spot rates
…………………Shilling forward rates
…………………..Cross rates
…………………………….Local contributors
…………………..Central Bank of Kenya Index
…………………Kenyan Bonds contributor pages
……………Treasury bill yields
………………Central bank open market operations
…………………….Horizontal repo transactions
,…………….Daily interbank lending rate
………………………..Kenya Bond pricing
……………………………NSE-20 Share Index
……………………………NSE-25 Share Index
……………………………NSE All Share Index
………………………FT NSE Kenya 15 Index
……………………..
FT NSE Kenya 25 Index
SPEED GUIDES:
($1 = 118.2000 Kenyan shillings)
(Reporting by George Obulutsa; Editing by James Macharia Chege)
