Gulf Cooperation Council and Currency

Al Mansoori: The central bank maintains a firm commitment to the peg, according to Business Week. Investors have increased bets that the six Gulf Cooperation Council countries may be next to abandon their pegs after China devalued the yuan and Kazakhstan allowed its currency to float. The dirham peg to the US dollar has served the UAE well over time, Al Mansoori said in an e-mailed answer to Bloomberg News questions. Saudi Arabia, the world biggest oil exporter, has already said it had no plans to decouple from the US currency. One-year forward contracts for the currency, an indication of where the dirham is expected to trade in the period, dropped 24 points since then to 91.45 points. Bets for a devaluation of the dirham surged in the past month to the highest in more than six years on 10 September, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. (news.financializer.com). As reported in the news.