PUTRAJAYA: The government and Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) will discuss strategies to deal with the continuous decline in the value of the ringgit at the weekly Cabinet meeting today.
“I will raise the matter in the Cabinet meeting this afternoon.
“We leave it (strategies) to BNM so that this matter doesn’t get worse,” deputy finance minister Ahmad Maslan said, adding that the central bank will be represented in the meeting.
He said this to reporters after the launch of the Sustainable Investing Standards (SIS) document.
The continuous decline in the value of the ringgit will make imports more costly, leading to fears that it will have an impact on the country’s inflation rate.
The ringgit opened at a six-month low of 4.6280/4.6305 to the US dollar today, compared with yesterday’s closing of 4.6245/4.6285.
Ahmad attributed the decline in the value of the ringgit to the ongoing stalemate in the discussions over raising the US debt ceiling from the current level of US$31.4 trillion.
The US Treasury department has warned that the US government could run short of funds to cover its expenses as soon as June 1 unless a new debt ceiling is approved.
“As it(the new debt ceiling) has not been approved, investors are still holding onto their money, so demand for the US dollar is strong,” Ahmad said.
“We hope this phenomenon is only temporary and the ringgit returns to the stable levels that we’ve seen over the past six months.”
