MUSCAT: This surge was driven by a 22.1 percent rise in narrow money (M1) and a 7.1 percent increase in quasi-money, which includes savings deposits, time deposits, certificates of deposit, margin accounts, and foreign currency deposits in the banking sector.
Despite the overall growth, cash held by the public declined by 8 percent, while demand deposits jumped by 30.1 percent, reflecting a shift in liquidity preferences.
In the conventional commercial banking sector, the weighted average interest rate on deposits in Omani riyals increased from 2.603 percent in November 2023 to 2.733 percent in November 2024. Meanwhile, the weighted average interest rate on loans increased from 5.485 percent to 5.667 percent during the same period.
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On the interbank front, the average overnight lending rate dipped to 4.563 percent in November 2024, down from 5.459 percent a year earlier. This decline was linked to the easing of the weighted average interest rate on repurchase operations, which fell to 5.308 percent from 6 percent, aligning with policy adjustments by the US Federal Reserve.
