Hong Kong Steps Up Currency Peg Defense as Pressure Rises: Chart

(Bloomberg) -- The Hong Kong Monetary Authority on Tuesday bought HK$14.7 billion ($1.9 billion) of local currency, the biggest single-day purchase since it started to defend the dollar peg last week. That took total intervention to HK$33.7 billion. OCBC Wing Hang expects HKMA interventions to remain frequent in the coming months. While that shouldn’t be an issue for the de facto central bank, which has $440.3 billion in foreign reserves at end-March, about seven times the local currency in circulation, the interventions effectively drain liquidity in the banking system and send interbank rates higher.

--With assistance from Matt Turner

To contact the reporter on this story: Emma Dai in Hong Kong at edai8@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Richard Frost at rfrost4@bloomberg.net, Fion Li

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