By Adedapo Adesanya
The Naira fell marginally by 0.02 per cent or N55 Kobo on the US Dollar at the Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEX) to exchange at N1,483.02/$1 on Wednesday, June 19 versus the preceding session’s N1,482.47/$1.
It was the first time the market was operating since last Friday because of the public holidays declared on Monday and Tuesday to celebrate Eid-el-Kabir.
But the value of the local currency appreciated in the official market at midweek against the Pound Sterling by N5.87 to sell for N1,870.52/£1 compared with the previous trading day’s exchange rate of N1,876.39/£1 and against the Euro, the Nigerian currency lost N4.00 to finish at N1,576.19/€1 versus N1,580.19/€1.
Data showed that there was a drop in the supply of forex yesterday by 17.8 per cent or $32.74 to quote at $150.73 million versus last Friday’s $183.47 million.
However, in the parallel market, the local currency maintained stability against the greenback during the trading session at N1,485/$1.
Meanwhile, cryptocurrencies were largely negative on Wednesday but good news saw Ethereum (ETH) receive a boost of 0.6 per cent to trade near $3,600, closing at $3,580.90.
The US Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) enforcement division has closed its investigation into Ethereum 2.0 by Consensys Software Inc. This means that the SEC will not bring charges alleging that sales of ETH are securities transactions.
Ripple (XRP) appreciated by 0.5 per cent yesterday to trade at $0.494.
But Solana (SOL) slumped by 3.2 per cent to finish at $135.48, Cardano (ADA) went down by 1.3 per cent to quote at $0.3908, Dogecoin (DOGE), the meme coin, recording a 1.1 per cent fall to sell at $0.1243, Binance Coin (BNB) depreciated by 0.3 per cent to settle at $603.64, Bitcoin (BTC) slid by 0.2 per cent to end the session at $65,473.52, and Litecoin (LTC) made a 0.03 per cent decline to close at $74.32, while the US Dollar Tether (USDT) and the US Dollar Coin (USDC) remained unchanged at $1.00 flat, respectively.
Dipo Olowookere