Cedi Slips After BoG Pauses Dollar Sales: Is the Bank Heeding IMF’s Warning? All Eyes on MPC’s Next Move

The Ghana’s cedi, which had been riding high in recent months, took an unexpected dip on the local market on Monday, unsettling importers and traders.

Market watchers tell The High Street Journal that the Bank of Ghana (BoG) did not intervene in the interbank foreign exchange market on Monday, marking a departure from its recent posture of supporting the cedi with dollar injections.

This development from the Central Bank is believed to have been influenced by mounting pressure from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on the BoG to reduce its footprint on the forex market.

 The Bank of Ghana, in 2025 alone, has pumped over $1.4 billion into the forex market to anchor the strength of the cedi. This move, the IMF believes, is interfering with the true value of the cedi

A source within the financial markets confirmed to The High Street Journal that the BoG stayed out entirely, leading to the cedi losing some ground.

At the same time, the U.S. dollar experienced its biggest single-day gain on the global market since May, tightening the squeeze on emerging market currencies, including Ghana’s.

BoG’s recent non-intervention raises key questions about how the central bank plans to balance two competing pressures: the need to stabilize the local currency to anchor inflation, and the IMF’s demand for a more market-determined exchange rate as part of Ghana’s bailout conditions.

Meanwhile, the cedi’s appreciation in the first half of 2025 brought some relief to Ghanaians by lowering fuel prices, easing import costs, and cooling inflation. The development on Monday can be seen as a warning to the market. Without BoG’s steady hand in the dollar market, the cedi may not be as resilient as many believed.

The timing couldn’t be more critical. The 125th Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting is in session, with the market anxiously watching for signals of the Bank’s next steps.

Will the MPC hint at a return to more strategic interventions? Or will they toe the IMF line more strictly and allow market forces to do the heavy lifting, risking volatility in the process?

This development underscores how Ghana’s economy is highly susceptible to exchange fluctuation, as always asserted by U.S.-based Finance Professor Pat Obi.

Now the BoG finds itself walking a tightrope, balancing inflation control, revenue stability, and IMF conditionalities, all while trying to retain public confidence in the cedi.

As the MPC prepares to announce its decisions later this week, are eyes are on the BoG as the decision will have a far-reaching implication for the cedi’s future.

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