Sudanese Campaigns Urge Transfer of Dollars via Banking System

Sudanese shop owners wait for customers at a bazaar in Khartoum, Sudan, June 24, 2019. (Reuters)
Sudanese shop owners wait for customers at a bazaar in Khartoum, Sudan, June 24, 2019. (Reuters)
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Sudanese Campaigns Urge Transfer of Dollars via Banking System

Sudanese shop owners wait for customers at a bazaar in Khartoum, Sudan, June 24, 2019. (Reuters)
Sudanese shop owners wait for customers at a bazaar in Khartoum, Sudan, June 24, 2019. (Reuters)

Campaigns have been launched on social media to support the Sudanese government’s decision on Sunday to adopt a managed float of its currency and unified its fixed exchange rate.

The campaigns called on all the Sudanese abroad and at home to transfer their money through official banks to support the country’s economy and fight traders and speculators in foreign currencies in the black market.

Touring a number of banks and money exchange offices in the capital, Khartoum, Asharq Al-Awsat saw a remarkable turnout of citizens who queued to transfer foreign currencies into the Sudanese pound.

Social media activists rushed to post receipts of the financial transfers in dollars and Saudi riyals. They launched a campaign to encourage the people, urging them to spend their money through official outlets to curb black market practices.

Majdi al-Hajj, an employee at the Faisal Islamic Bank at the University of Khartoum, told Asharq Al-Awsat that the bank transferred money for individuals from euros, US dollars and the Saudi riyal at the new official rate.

He said it was a promising start, adding that he expects the amounts transferred to soon increase.

Meanwhile, the buying and selling activities in the black market saw a remarkable drop due to the lack of demand and the abundance of supply.

A currency dealer in the Arab market in central Khartoum told Asharq Al-Awsat that the “currency trade has weakened significantly, prompting us to reduce the price of the dollar from 390 to 380 pounds,” but he expected the market to recover at any time.

He attributed the price decline in the free market to the lack of demand and the large supply of foreign currencies.

However, he pointed out that banks do not currently meet the needs for foreign currencies.

Secretary-General of the Secretariat of Sudanese Working Abroad (SSWA) Makin Hamid Terrab told Asharq Al-Awsat that the agency held several meetings with the economic sector in the transitional government to discuss the remittances of Sudanese expatriates and immigrants.

Unifying the exchange rate is a positive measure that ensures the flow of remittances, he stressed, noting that they are estimated at a minimum of six billion dollars annually. “It also helps attract foreign capital and international aid.”

He added that solutions are being studied to meet Vision 2021. They include providing assistance to Sudanese abroad in terms of education, housing and health insurance, he said.

The US dollar had been trading at over 350 pounds to the dollar on the black market, while its official rate was at 55 pounds to the dollar.

Following the flotation, local media reported banks were selling the dollar at an average of 375 pounds, and buying the US currency for an average of 390, in an attempt to attract those trading in the unofficial currency market.

The government is hoping to introduce remittances of Sudanese expatriates and immigrants abroad into the formal banking system. Most of these remittances used to be traded in the black market.



South Korea's Hanwha Ocean Targets US Navy Orders as Trump Seeks Shipbuilding Ties

Steve SK Jeong, Head of Naval Ship International Business Department of Hanwha Ocean, speaks during an interview with Reuters in Seoul, South Korea, May 2, 2025.   REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji
Steve SK Jeong, Head of Naval Ship International Business Department of Hanwha Ocean, speaks during an interview with Reuters in Seoul, South Korea, May 2, 2025. REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji
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South Korea's Hanwha Ocean Targets US Navy Orders as Trump Seeks Shipbuilding Ties

Steve SK Jeong, Head of Naval Ship International Business Department of Hanwha Ocean, speaks during an interview with Reuters in Seoul, South Korea, May 2, 2025.   REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji
Steve SK Jeong, Head of Naval Ship International Business Department of Hanwha Ocean, speaks during an interview with Reuters in Seoul, South Korea, May 2, 2025. REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji

South Korean shipbuilder Hanwha Ocean aims to boost its revenue from overseas military vessels to around 4 trillion won ($2.91 billion) by 2030 and hopes to pick up more repair orders from the US Navy, a senior executive told Reuters.

The Asian country is a major global shipbuilder and trade talks with the US on tariffs brought up possible cooperation in the sector after US President Donald Trump signed an executive order to restore US shipbuilding.

Hanwha Ocean, formerly Daewoo Shipbuilding, is one of the largest shipbuilders in the world with an order book of $31.43 billion as of the end of March. It acquired a US shipyard in Philadelphia last year to expand in the market.

Its naval ships business, which has built dozens of submarines and surface vessels used by the South Korean Navy, has won two orders from the US Navy since last year to repair and overhaul its ships for the first time.

"I think we may be the biggest shipyard in the world that has taken on these maintenance, repair and overhaul orders from the US Navy," said Steve SK Jeong, head of the Naval Ship Global Business at Hanwha Ocean, days after US Secretary of the Navy John Phelan visited its shipyard.

"It is not very profitable, but learning the process of working with the US Navy is valuable, which will help if we win newbuild orders."

Hanwha Ocean hoped to win a double-digit number of US Navy maintenance and repair orders before 2030, Jeong said.

Trump has vowed to spend "a lot of money on shipbuilding" to restore US capacity, and cited concern over how his country has fallen behind in an industry that is also dominated by China.

Still, US laws can make it harder for foreign shipyards even if they have US operations. They are prohibited from building US Navy vessels, due to the Byrnes-Tollefson Amendment of the US Department of Defense Appropriations Act.

TRANSPLANTING PROCESSES

Hanwha Ocean's Philadelphia Shipyard is trying to get a license that clears it to build US Navy vessels, but transplanting cutting-edge manufacturing processes honed from competition with other South Korean and Chinese shipyards is not as simple as bringing in some automated welding machines, Jeong said.

"I think the US shipbuilding industry hasn't had to compete very much. Facilities are old, and there's a shortage of technicians," Jeong said.

"We are looking to modernize facilities, train and equip workers, and bring in our manufacturing process that can build the same ship in, I think, two-thirds the time or less as that of a US shipyard."

Jeong said the company is investing in South Korea to use existing facilities and expand naval ship capacity to build five submarines and three surface vessels at the same time by 2029, from two submarines and two surface vessels now.

Despite building 17 submarines for the South Korean Navy since 1987, Hanwha Ocean has only actively competed for overseas orders in the last few years as South Korea's low birthrate and shrinking military-age population risk cooling local demand.

It is competing to export submarines to Poland and Canada, a frigate to Thailand as well as knocking on the door in markets in the Middle East, South America, North Africa and Southeast Asia, to build up a sustained flow of orders that would bring foreign sales to 4 trillion won by 2030, Jeong said.

That would be about four times the size of its 1.05 trillion won of revenue in 2024.