Dhaka, Feb. 5 -- Forex-strapped banks' demand for US dollar heightens from the start of the calendar year as the central bank fed into them the highest-ever monthly dollop of $1.60 billion in January, sources said.

Such mounting trend in drip-dollar feeding into the commercial banks has been intensifying the existing pressures on the country's depleting foreign-currency (forex) reserves, said the sources at the Bangladesh Bank (BB).

They said the commercial bank's demand for the US currency began rising remarkably from the immediate past month of January mainly because of the increased dollar demand by banks, the state-owned ones in particular, for settling their overseas payment obligations in import of fossil fuels and fertilisers.

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