The large capital inflows spurred an investment and real estate bubble. Financial institutions were lending excessively and imprudently, lending to rapidly deteriorating asset quality. The central bank made matters worse by trying to shore up ailing financial institutions. The strengthening of the US dollar relative to other major currencies starting in 1995 and China’s rapid emergence into the world market also weakened Thailand’s competitiveness. In 1996, exports declined by about 1.3% compared with over 20% growth in both 1994 and 1995. The weakened fundamental led to pressures on the bath and market perception was that the bath needed to be devalued, and speculators attacked the Bath in various waves. What made matters worse was that the Bank of Thailand (BOT) tried to stubbornly defend the value of the bath. By the end of June 1997 almost all of the country’s reserves had been used to try to defend the value of the bath and official foreign reserves net of committed forward obligations declined to only about $US2.8 billion. The country basically became in solvent as there was still about $US48.5 billion in short-term foreign debt and the current account deficit was about $US1 billion per month. Thailand simply did not have enough foreign assets to service these obligations. As a result, the bath had to be floated July 2, 1997, and Thailand had to seek assistance from the IMF