A cost of GH¢8.6billion was incurred by the Bank of Ghana (BoG) in 2024 for its open market operations (OMO), contributing significantly to the central bank’s annual operating loss of GH¢9.49billion.
Per the bank’s 2024 annual report, the GH¢8.6billion OMO cost represents a modest increase over the GH¢8.37billion recorded in 2023. This increase reflects sustained interest expenses arising from the issuance of central bank securities and sterilisation instruments used to absorb liquidity from the banking system.
BoG’s sterilisation efforts absorbed a total of GH¢134billion in liquidity throughout 2024. This intensive liquidity mop-up – amounting to 1.7 percent of GDP – was instrumental in sustaining macroeconomic stability, even though it was not a direct driver of GDP growth.
In fact, real GDP expanded by 5.7 percent in 2024, supported mainly by structural gains in the industrial (7.1 percent), services (6.1 percent) and agriculture (2.8 percent) sectors. Key contributors included mining, construction, crop production and digital communications, rather than monetary policy interventions.
Inflation in 2024 remained elevated but relatively stable, fluctuating between 23 percent and 25 percent. Despite the narrowing gap in sterilisation efforts, BoG continued to invest in liquidity control tools during 2025.
The central bank absorbed GH¢15.5billion in February, GH¢21.6billion in March and GH¢33.3billion in April – setting a record high for monthly liquidity absorption.
A significant contributor to the overall loss in 2024 was also the central bank’s participation in the Gold for Oil (G4O) programme.
The BoG committed GH¢4.69billion in seed capital to support the scheme but recorded a loss of GH¢1.82billion from the programme in 2024 alone. Cumulative losses from the G4O programme now stand at over GH¢2.1billion.
In light of these sustained losses, the board of directors approved the bank’s withdrawal from the programme in March 2025.
Against this backdrop, the BoG, the Ministry of Finance, and the International Monetary Fund reached an agreement on recapitalisation, formalised in a Memorandum of Understanding signed on 6 January 2025. The agreement is aimed at rebuilding the central bank’s financial buffers while maintaining its operational independence.
Under the current IMF programme, the bank has committed to refraining from monetary financing of government’s budget in adherence to the zero-financing agreement signed with the Ministry of Finance.
