Naira Plunges 11.4% to N927/$1 at Official Market as FX Demand Rises

By Adedapo Adesanya

The Naira started the first trading session in the last month of 2023 on a negative note after it depreciated against the Dollar in the Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEM), which is the official FX window, by 11.4 per cent or N94.87 on Friday, December 1, closing at N927.19/$1, in contrast to Thursday’s exchange rate of N832.32/$1.

The December rush for forex contributed to the weakening of the domestic currency in the spot market yesterday, as the supply of foreign currency could not meet what customers needed.

Data showed that the value of FX transactions recorded at the market during the trading day was $110.14 million compared with the previous day’s $115.41 million, indicating a decline of 4.6 per cent or $5.27 million.

The inability of the official market to satisfy the appetite of customers put pressure on the unregulated FC market on Friday, with the local currency depleted by N5 against the greenback in the parallel market to close at N1,165/$1 compared with Thursday’s value of N1,160/$1.

However, the Nigerian currency appreciated against its United States counterpart yesterday by N8 in the Peer-to-Peer (P2P) window to sell at N1,148/$1 versus N1,156/$1,

The Naira lost N158.01 against the Pound Sterling during the session at NAFEM to settle at N1,204.10/£1, in contrast to the previous day’s N1,046.09/£1 and against the Euro, it slumped by N95.37 to sell at N1,036.06/€1 compared with Thursday’s rate of N940.69/€1.

Meanwhile, the cryptocurrency market was mixed, with Bitcoin (BTC) growing by 1.9 per cent to $38,112.80, and Dogecoin (DOGE) gained 3.1 per cent to sell at $0.0839.

Further, Ethereum (ETH) rose by 2.7 per cent to $2,090.27, Ripple (XRP) recorded a 0.8 per cent jump to $0.6105, Litecoin (LTC) increased by 0.4 per cent to $70.09, Binance Coin (BNB) appreciated by 0.4 per cent to $228.88, and  Cardano (ADA) expanded by 0.1 per cent to $0.378

However, Solana (SOL) weakened by \0.3 per cent rise to sell at $60.34, while the US Dollar Tether (USDt) and the US Dollar Coin (USDC) closed flat at $1.00 apiece.