According to a survey on banking conditions conducted by the Central Bank of West African States (BCEAO) for the month of July 2020, the rate of remuneration of bank deposits decreased by 0.22 percentage points. Thus, the bank rate of remuneration in the WAEMU area came out at 5.05% during the month of July, against 5.27% raised the previous month.

This is news that will not be too much to the liking of the holders of debt on the banks of the WAEMU zone. Indeed, the latter saw their July deposits remunerated for a value less than that of June.

Is this situation dependent on the reduction of the key rates (rates at the level of the central bank) of the BCEAO from 24 June 2020? Technically this can be linked to other factors because the fall in key rates should instead raise the level of the rate of remuneration of customer deposits or the interest on the bank deposit. On the other hand, the lending interest rates applied by banks to their customers, that is to say, the interest rate on bank credit, remained stable according to the BCEAO. Thus, as in June 2020, excluding charges and taxes, the average borrowing rate calculated at the WAEMU level was 6.7%.

 
On the regional money market, the average amount of bids on the weekly auction window was 3,457.5 billion CFA francs in July 2020 compared to 3,450.3 billion CFA francs in June 2020, a slight increase of 0.2%. According to the BCEAO, all those tenders were accepted. Thanks to the reduction in the KEY rates of the BCEAO from 24 June 2020, the weighted average rate on the weekly window came out at 2.00% during the month under review against 2.40% the previous month.

On the interbank market, the average weekly volume of operations, all maturities combined (receipt and full disbursement), amounted to 278.8 billion CFA francs in July against 236.8 billion CFA francs in June, an increase of 42 billion CFA francs. As for the weighted average rate of these operations, it was down to 3.01% against 3.48% the previous month.

Under the one-week segment, the average volume of operations came out at 178.3 billion FCFA after 160.5 billion in June, an increase of 11.09%. The average interest rate on this window is also down 0.41 percentage points, reaching 2.83% during the period under review compared to 3.24% in June 2020.