Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) — As of 15 May 2025, the U.S. dollar is trading at 12,983 Uzbek soums. This marks a sharp weekly depreciation of the national currency by 0.72%. The previous week, the soum had already weakened by 0.32%. This recent dynamic is drawing considerable attention.

What makes this particularly unusual is that the soum’s closest benchmark — the Russian ruble — has strengthened to its highest level in two years. There is typically a correlation between the soum and the ruble, but this linkage appears to have broken down, currently working against the Uzbek currency.

At the end of April, Uzbekistan’s gold and foreign exchange reserves increased by US$1.4 billion, reaching a total of US$49.25 billion. Foreign currency reserves alone rose from US$10.4 billion to US$11.0 billion. These figures are generally positive, largely due to favorable gold market performance in April, when gold prices climbed nearly 6%.

The Central Bank of Uzbekistan anticipates that inflation will begin to slow from 2026 onwards. Currently, the annual consumer price index exceeds 10%, driven largely by price liberalization reforms, particularly in the energy sector. The Central Bank views 2025 as the final difficult year in terms of inflationary pressure.

According to official forecasts, inflation is expected to ease to 8% by the end of 2025 and further decline to 6% in 2026.

A reduction in inflationary pressure could help stabilize the exchange rate of the soum.

In the coming week, the USD/UZS pair is expected to fluctuate within the range of 12,880 to 13,020 soums.

Anna Bodrova, Analyst at Alpari