Within the recent week, the American dollar rose in Armenia, to above 400 drams for the first time in four years.

Banks buy one dollar at 400-403 drams and sell at 405-407 drams.

Political analyst Yervand Bozoyan says that the abrupt devaluation of the Armenian dram after the hike in natural gas tariffs may again cause price increases in general.

“Under these conditions, a 10-15-percent price hike is inevitable in May-June,” Bozoyan told ArmeniaNow.

He says that unless the Armenian Government takes conscientious measures and regulates the taxation sector, the business sector will greatly suffer, and the flight of capital from Armenia will be on a mass scale.

The Public Relations Department of the Central Bank of Armenia said they cannot provide any comment on this issue (dram devaluation), because they carry out “a floating exchange rate policy.” The CBA policy began after the famous ‘Black Tuesday’ on March 3, 2009, when the CB let the dram free-float, with the dollar exchange rate reaching from 300 to 360 drams.

Abrupt price hikes occurred then. This time, experts have already registered rise in prices of imported fuel because of the dram devaluation: in March there was a 30-dram price hike (0.07 cent), now one liter of petrol costs 390-440 drams (0.9 cent - $1.08) instead of the previous 360-410 drams (0.8 cent - $1.01).