Georgia August Dollar Sales Surge Amid Russia Crisis

By Emma O'Brien

Sept. 1 (Bloomberg) -- Georgia's central bank sold more dollars in August than in any other month in at least nine years as the former Soviet republic sought to support the lari amid its five-day war with neighboring Russia.

The $187.2 million that was sold amounted to almost 13 percent of Georgia's $1.5 billion reserves, according to central bank figures. The sales were the highest since the National Bank of Georgia started to compile data on foreign-exchange interventions on its Web site in January 1999.

Allegations that Georgia attacked Russian peacekeepers and citizens in the breakaway region of South Ossetia spurred Russia to send in forces on Aug. 8. The conflict, condemned by the U.S. and Europe, prompted the National Bank to cut its benchmark interest rate to 11 percent from 12 percent and Standard & Poor's and Fitch Ratings to lower Georgia's credit ratings.

``The ruble tanked during all this, so imagine what would have happened to the lari'' without the dollar sales, said Vladimir Osakovsky, an analyst in Moscow at Milan-based UniCredit SpA, the bank with the largest assets in eastern Europe. ``The stable currency provided an anchor of financial stability amid the crisis.''

The central bank's actions, which included the sale of $12.9 million on the day of Russia's incursion, helped limit the lari's loss against the dollar to 0.1 percent last month, Osakovsky said in an interview.

Stability `Important'

Georgia's stocks and bonds slumped during the conflict. The 7.5 percent 13-year government security slid, pushing the yield 147 basis points higher to 9.94 percent. The yield jumped to a record 10.75 percent on Aug. 11. Bank of Georgia, the only stock listed outside the country, tumbled 32 percent, the biggest monthly drop since it started trading in November 2006.

The dollar sales by the National Bank, led by Governor David Amaglobeli, 32, amounted to about 15 percent of all the currency in circulation in Georgia, according to Osakovsky.

``In Georgia, people look at the exchange rate as an indicator of the whole economy, so it was important to keep it stable,'' said Archil Mestvirishvili, head of the central bank's macroeconomics and statistics department in the capital Tbilisi. ``If the demand for currency was larger than supply we intervened.''

The lari, which is managed by the central bank to limit the impact of its fluctuations on the competitiveness of exports, was little changed at 1.4099 per dollar on Aug. 29.

Russia's ruble, which in August had its worst monthly decline against the dollar since March 1999, fell 0.1 percent to 24.6762 today. The nation's central bank lets the ruble trade freely within a band against a basket made up of dollars and euros. It lost 1.7 percent versus the basket last month.

Georgian economic growth will probably be 9 percent this year, down from 12.4 percent in 2007, Amaglobeli said Aug. 21, nine days after President Dmitry Medvedev called off Russia's military operation. Russian peacekeepers remain in the Georgian port city of Poti and in the separatist regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, whose independence Russia has recognized.

To contact the reporter on this story: Emma O'Brien in Moscow at eobrien6@bloomberg.net