Furthermore, high dollarization makes depreciation a dangerous process for the financial sector, as many people with loans or debts in US dollars are unable to pay. In addition, high and persistent dollarization constrains the effectiveness of the monetary policy, as the transmission of the monetary policy to the market interest rates and real variables are rather limited.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the newly independent state underwent serious turmoil, including civil war, deteriorated governance, depreciation of critical infrastructure, and endemic corruption. But after the Rose Revolution in 2003, the country began to implement major political and economic reforms

On November 4th, President of ISET Eric Livny and the Team Leader of the German Economic Team (GET) Ricardo Giucci held a joint session for stakeholders on their most recent study: Depreciation of Lari: “Necessary and Effective”, that GET produced in cooperation with ISET-PI.

The Georgian lari’s depreciation against the dollar has been a pressing issue for everyone: economists and policymakers, students, housewives, and even the good-for-nothing “birzhavik’s”.

The average residential rental price first fell to 7.46 USD per m2 (a historical minimum since the start of the study) in October 2015, and after a slight peak in the following month reached 7.66 USD per m2 by the end of the year.