YEREVAN, March 28. /ARKA/. Bagrat Asatryan, a former chairman of the Central Bank of Armenia, said today that there are no grounds for thinking that the dollar may go up in Armenia.
He told journalists that transfers grew 11% in January, exports grew 30% in January and February and imports about 10%.

“It means there are no economic grounds for the dollar to rise,” he said.

The dollar traded at 410 to 415 drams in March and continued its upward motion to 420 drams.
Asatrayn said the dollar, as a rule, is driven up over a period between January and April by the usual for this season pressure at forex market.

He said that Armenia’s national currency devaluated by 13 drams over the first three months of this year against devaluation by 10 drams in Jan-March 2012 and 5.6 drams at the same period of 2011.
Asatryan also said that an intense outflow of money (about $500 million) from the country was seen yet in 2012, and things may continue.

The former head of the central bank didn’t rule out further devaluation of the dram, but said this situation shouldn’t be overdramatized.

“I am convinced that Armenia is not among those countries where price rise will be lower than average increase in Europe,” he added. ---0---