Having gone through several days of lost value, the Jamaican dollar appreciated by 1.4 per cent last week relative to the US dollar week-over-week.

The dollar moved from a selling rate of J$154.31 to US$1 on Friday, April 30 to $152.15 at the close of trading last Friday, May 7. This was due to a shortage in Jamaican dollar liquidity, which prompted brokers and dealers to sell their US$ positions for J$.

In the meantime, liquidity for US$ money market remained generally moderate. NCB Capital Markets reports that broker market demand was for 60-day-and-longer tenured funds.

However, Jamaican dollar liquidity conditions were very tight, with some broker market players opting to lend overnight to a week only. The average yield of the Bank of Jamaica’s (BOJ’s) competitive auction on its 30-days CD saw an uptick of 0.52 per cent relative to 0.50 per cent in the prior two weeks.

The highest bid for full allocation was 0.525 per cent. A total of J$7.0 billion was offered in the auction, while the total bids received was J$25.71 billion.