RUPIAH FALLS 13 POINTS EARLY THURSDAY

Jakarta, March 12 (ANTARA) - The rupiah fell 13 points against the US dollar at the Jakarta interbank spot market early Thursday on profit taking transactions.

The local currency traded at Rp11,983/11,988, down 13 points from Rp11,970/11,980 at the market's close a day earlier.
"The rupiah's gains over the last two days encouraged market players to release the Indonesian currency for profit taking as the rupiah was at the level of below Rp12,000 per US dollar," Kostaman Thayib, retail banking director of PT Bank Mega, said here on Thursday.
The rupiah advanced 30 points in the first 20 minutes after the market's opening, he said.
The local currency was still under pressure due to the current global financial crisis and investors tended to buy the greenback, he said.
However, he considered the rupiah's depreciation to be still a normal development.
Another factor which pressured the rupiah was the government's appeal for bank interest rate cuts in order to boost real sector growth, he said.
Bankers tended to be very cautious in channeling credits to avoid possible credit refunding problems in the future, he said.
He, however, expressed optimism that the Indonesian currency would still have a chance to gain because the bonds issued by the government had received favorable responses in money markets.