By Modupe Gbadeyanka
The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has disclosed that in the third quarter of 2019, the Nigeria banking sector pulled a total volume of 800,201,498 transactions valued at N42.76 trillion.
These transactions were carried out in the period under review via the different electronic payment channels in the sector. It was further stated that NIBSS Instant Payments (NIP) transactions dominated the volume of transactions recorded; 298,988,572 worth N26.18 trillion.
An analysis done by Business Post showed that cheques accounted for N1.01 trillion with 1.92 million volume, while ATM recorded 212.8 million transactions worth N1.62 trillion, with POS having 121.4 million transactions valued at N856.9 billion.
In addition, a total of 26.7 million transactions worth N120.6 billion were carried out in the first nine months of this year via the web, while 113.1 million deals worth N1.4 trillion occurred via mobile payment platforms in the period under consideration.
Under the Remita platform, 13.1 million transactions valued at N5.0 trillion were done in Q3 2019, while NAPS had 12.0 million transactions worth N6.4 trillion were executed, with Central Pay recording 111,273 transactions valued at N1.2 billion.
In a report released by the agency, it was disclosed that in terms of credit to private sector, the total value of credit allocated by the bank stood at N16.25 trillion as at Q3 2019, while oil/gas and manufacturing sectors got credit allocation of N3.39 trillion and N2.57 trillion respectively.
It further said as at the third quarter of this year, the total number of banks’ staff decreased by 2.81 percent quarter-on-quarter from 104,364 in the second quarter of 2019 to 101,435.
Dipo Olowookere 
Aduragbemi Omiyale