. currently, we have us $ 3. 3 billion dollars in foreign currency deposits in the banking system. here ’ s where it gets interesting, and the foreign exchange story gets a bit murkier. there are many business leaders who often give their opinions freely on foreign exchange, many go the media and have been extremely vocal on the matter. many businesses have legitimate requests for foreign exchange and we acknowledge your requests are not always met on time, and it is for this reason central bank has taken us $ 1. 7 billion dollars from our reserves for the year so far to help meet your unsatisfied demand. however, we ’ ve noticed a trend, where businesses make noise for foreign exchange to pay bills for trade - related purposes and actively lobby the authorized dealers and central bank for us dollars. when the money is provided, the funds are promptly deposited in their foreign currency account and left unused and the noise about not being able to get money for business continues. i do have one tip for businesses trying to get foreign exchange ; it helps if you don ’ t conduct business with companies with terrorist links as we have strict laws on anti - money laundering and combatting the financing of terrorism. as i indicated before, central bank steps into the market to meet the shortfall in foreign exchange supply and that presently accounts for just over 25 percent of total supply. so why can ’ t we supply 50 percent or 80 percent, or even all? why must we ensure that we have enough official reserves put aside? well... let me ask you this... what if the global financial crisis goes on for another five years? what if the fed raises interest rates faster and more than expected next year and causes tremendous volatility in global currency, stock and bond markets? what if the ebola virus spreads to the caribbean region? when we factor in the chance of these external events happening, we have to ensure we have enough official reserves as insurance just in case something does happen. the plan is to ensure we don ’ t deplete these reserves, as we once did in the late 1980s, because it took us 30 years to finally reach to today ’ s us $ 11 billion. and yes, this us $ 11 billion includes us $ 1. 175 billion from proceeds from the sale of mhtl. in benchmarking, we have just over one year ’ s worth of official reserves. this means if i took all the official reserves and gave it to the business community,

meeting. next year, for the first time in eight years, we are likely to see a hike in the fed funds rate, probably in summer of 2015. there is considerable uncertainty in global financial markets about the pace and magnitude of these expected increases in us interest rates. for trinidad and tobago, this uncertainty could result in a weakening of capital inflows or acceleration of capital outflows. central bank of trinidad and tobago is already putting measures in place, through available monetary policy tools, such as increasing its policy interest rate, to insulate our economy, as much as possible, from the shocks we are expected to feel by rising us interest rates. apart from the dark clouds hovering in the united states, geopolitical risks are mounting in various parts of the world. we started 2014 with a possible escalation of conflict between russia and ukraine. we are ending the year with an ebola outbreak in africa and an upsurge of isis in the middle east. so, you will realize i have gone through the trouble of first raising these murky international matters as they are early warning signs for global financial markets. developments on bis central bankers ’ speeches battlefields across the world can have an impact on our small island state. this is why i have raised them as they set the tone of how things are likely to unfold. recent economic developments i ’ ll begin with a brief overview of domestic economic conditions. following no growth in 2010 and in 2011, our economy recovered by approximately 1 ½ percent in 2012 and grew by 1. 7 percent in 2013. in early 2014, central bank expected the trinidad and tobago economy to have continued its recovery, with growth projected at 2½ percent. for a number of reasons, this did not materialize. central bank ’ s latest economic review of the year now indicates economic growth is likely to be a modest ½ percent for 2014. this, of course, is well below our forecast for economic growth, made at the beginning of the year, of 2 ½ percent. so what accounts for this deviation? how could we the experts, as well as other agencies such as the imf, s & p and our own cso, get it so wrong? the unexpected slowdown in the economy was caused by a dismal performance in the energy sector, with declines most pronounced in natural gas and lng production. energy companies had indicated, in october 2013, the planned supply shutdowns and stoppages that had been taking place for the past