Al-Sudani’s advisor lists the reasons for the dollar’s rise in the Iraqi market.
On Tuesday, the Prime Minister’s financial advisor, Mazhar Mohammed Salih, attributed the rise in the dollar in Iraqi markets to cross-border speculative trading.
Saleh told Shafaq News Agency (according to his personal assessment), “The speculative and cross-border trade environment balances its risks between the decline of the dollar, the ease of parallel financing for fast trade, and its low administrative and regulatory costs, especially compliance and anti-money laundering procedures through official institutions, and the comparison between violating the law and the risks and the quick illusion of achieving profit, especially in small border trades.”
He continued: “Small commercial activity, as is well known, dominates more than half of the country’s foreign trade. The lower the dollar exchange rate compared to audit costs and the cost of banking and customs compliance, the more favorable the parallel market financing equation becomes, unless deterrent legal enforcement is tightened.”
He added, “Therefore, there is no reason for this renewed surge in dollars, despite their regular availability through the official banking system,” noting that this is consistent with international standards and requirements for monitoring the financing and flow of foreign trade, particularly import trade.
He pointed out that “the comparison between the cost of introducing advanced regulatory procedures and global applications, such as the clean regulation of foreign trade on goods entering from abroad, such as customs tracking and digital inspection control systems for imported goods, are steps that represent an advanced level of regulatory sophistication and customs inspection.”
Saleh concluded his remarks by saying, “This means that high-level enforcement of standardized controls on informal imports subject to anti-money laundering laws, broad and effective customs controls, and border crossing governance, which largely excludes informal trade, must increase as the parallel exchange rate improves with the decline of the dollar.”
Shafaq.com