Indonesia Daily Focus December 16, 2020
Macro Preview - December’s policy rate decision: Expecting BI to keep 7DRRR at 3.75%
Expecting 7DRRR to stay at 3.75%
Bank
Indonesia (BI) is scheduled to announce its latest policy rate decision
on Thursday (December 17). Last month, defying the consensus as well as
our own projection, the central bank decided to trim the 7-Day Reverse
Repo Rate by 25 bps to 3.75%, responding to the need for another round
of monetary stimulus, as well as Rupiah’s stellar appreciation
throughout the month.
We
foresee that the central bank would retain the 7-Day Reverse Repo Rate
at 3.75%, despite the disappointing macro data released lately that
justify the central bank to further lower its policy rate.
Macro data and Rupiah’s performance provides justification
Indonesia’s
consumer confidence and retail sales performance were still relatively
weak in November, in line with the ground check we conducted in
mid-November; we found that the confidence and purchasing power of
middle-high income earners remained relatively solid, while those of
middle-low income earners were still weak.
Further appreciation of Rupiah in December also presented the case for the central bank to lower its policy rate further.
Maintaining the stability of IDR
Nevertheless,
despite several justifications to lower its policy rate, we believe
that BI will choose to keep it on hold, as its top agenda will be
maintaining the stability of Rupiah.
Despite
the latest stellar appreciation of Rupiah, year-to-date, it remains one
of the worst performing currencies in the region. Furthermore, the
recent surge in new COVID-19 cases in the country should present notable
risks to Rupiah in the short term, especially given the fact that the
government is now pushing to take control of BI via Omnibus Law on
financial sector.
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