BSP: Peso-dollar rate to stay within P42-P45 range until 2012

With the United States' lower credit rating, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) on Monday predicted that the peso-dollar exchange rate from now until 2012 will stay within the P42 to P45 range. "Our macroeconomic assumptions include an exchange rate of P42 to P45 pesos per dollar for 2011 and 2012," BSP Governor Amando Tetangco said during the Senate finance committee's deliberations on the proposed 2012 national budget on Monday. Tetangco admitted that the recent downgrade of the US' triple A credit rating to AA+ might weaken the peso against the dollar but that this should not be any cause for alarm. "That is the first possibility (but) there is another possibility," he said. He explained that once the market has "digested" the downgrade, most of the market economies will realize that they are actually resilient and are the drivers of economic growth. "The steady inflow of OFW remittances and export receipts and sufficient level of reserves should also provide support to the peso," he said. - VVP, GMA News