By Adedapo Adesanya
The Nigerian Naira lost N6 against the US Dollar at the parallel channel of the foreign exchange market on Wednesday, May 26 as it closed at N493/$1 compared to the previous session’s N487/$1.
This decline in the value of the Naira was engineered by the adoption of the Investors and Exporters (I&E) exchange rate as the official rate for the country.
This action also plunged the value of the domestic currency against the British Pound Sterling at the unregulated segment of the FX market yesterday by N1 to N688/£1 from the preceding day’s N687/£1 and also battered the Naira against the Euro by N2, closing at N592/€1 compared with N590/€1 of Tuesday.
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is planning to unify the multiple exchange rates in the country as advised by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and others.
With the adoption of the NAFEX as the new official exchange rate, the Naira is now pegged at N410.25/$1 at the interbank window of the forex market instead of the previous N379/$1.
But at the I&E window on Wednesday, the domestic currency was traded at N411.50/$1 in contrast to N411.56/$1 it was sold on Tuesday, indicating that it appreciated by 6 kobo or 0.02 per cent.
According to data on the FMDQ Securities Exchange, there was a surge in the demand for FX at the market segment as transactions valued at $471.85 million were carried out, 261.6 per cent or $341.35 million higher than the $130.50 million executed the previous day.
Bulls Return to Cryptocurrency Market
After the pressure of the past few days, the bulls returned to the cryptocurrency market yesterday as seven of the digital currencies tracked by Business Post all appreciated, according to data sourced from Quidax, a platform used for trading cryptocurrencies in Naira in Nigeria.
Bitcoin (BTC) gained 0.8 per cent to sell at N9,303,003.60; Ethereum (ETH) grew by 8.5 per cent to trade at N1,392,499.00, Ripple (XRP) rose by 2.4 per cent to sell at N506.88, while Dash (DASH) appreciated by 19.9 per cent to sell for N110,682.22.
Also, Litecoin (LTC) improved by 1.1 per cent to sell at 90,012.00, Tron (TRX) gained 3.9 per cent to trade at N39.02 while the US Dollar Tether (USDT) went up by 0.2 per cent to sell for N507.26.
Dipo Olowookere