<div style="text-align: justify; "><b><span style="font-size: 1rem;">The BPDB's annual spending was roughly calculated as Tk 104,000 crore for purchasing electricity from the independent power producers (IPPs) for the fiscal year 2023-24. The total expense will now go up to about Tk 1,11,300 crore, according to officials familiar with the estimate this week, according to official sources.</span><br></b></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) is going to bear the brunt after recent enhancement of US Dollar rate as it will have to spend an additional amount of over Tk 7,300 crore to purchase electricity from the private sector.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But after the increase in the rate of USD by the central bank through the introduction of a crawling peg system, the BPDB has been a great victim of such a decision.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The Bangladesh Bank on May 8 unveiled the crawling peg exchange rate system and allowed banks to buy and sell US dollars freely near Tk117, as well as letting go of its regulatory power of the Smart rate, and hiking the repo rate.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Under this system, a crawling peg mid rate (CPMR) has been set at Tk117 per US dollar with immediate effect.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Scheduled banks may purchase and sell US dollars freely around the CPMR with their customers and in interbank deals, the notice also said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">A crawling peg system is a method of exchange rate adjustments that allows a currency with a fixed exchange rate to fluctuate within a band of rates. It is a hybrid of fixed and floating exchange rate systems.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"The payment mode of the power purchase agreements (PPAs) with the IPPS is in USD. So, we have to incur a huge financial loss when the USD rate goes up", a top official of the BPDB told.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As the issue is very sensitive, preferring anonymity, he said the BPDB's loss will be enormous this year as the dollar rate went up in one go by Tk 7 to Tk 117 from the Tk 110.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">He said the extra burden of paying Tk 7,300 crore will complicate the situation when the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has been insisting on reducing government's loss in buying electricity from the private sector. Source: UNB</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd/fas</div>