Deputies have passed on Wednesday 165 to 90 and 3 abstentions the bill initiated by Social-Democrats Liviu Dragnea and Serban Nicolae on the National Bank of Romania (BNR, central bank, ed. n.)'s status focused on the limitation of Romania's gold reserves abroad.
The opposition's National Liberal Party (PNL) deputy Pavel Popescu announced that the Liberals will challenge this bill to the Constitutional Court of Romania (CCR), while the Hungarian Democratic Union of Romania (UDMR) deputies' leader Attila Korodi said at the debates that the UDMR's deputies will vote against the PSD's bill.
According to the draft law, "the BNR by observing the general rules regarding liquidity and the external assets' specific risk establishes and maintains international reserves in such conditions that it could determine periodically their exact size, reserves made up cumulatively or selectively" from several elements, among which the gold held in the treasury in the country.
The text proposes that the BNR pursue to maintain the reserves at a level proper to Romania's external transactions.
The initiative stipulates that "from the constituted reserve, the BNR can deposit gold abroad exclusively to obtain incomes through trading and other specific operations".
"The gold deposits constituted by the central bank abroad cannot exceed 5pct of the total amount of gold constituted as reserve," the bill says.
AGERPRES