Amid FX Supply Crunch, Naira Falls at I&E, P2P, Black Market

By Adedapo Adesanya

The Naira depreciated at against the American Dollar at the Peer-2-Peer (P2P), the black market, and the Investors and Exporters (I&E) windows of the foreign exchange market on Friday, October 21, amid a strain in the supply of FX.

This weakened the Nigerian Naira by N2 against the US currency at the P2P window to N758/$1 in contrast to the N756/$1 it was transacted on Thursday.

In the spot market, the domestic currency suffered a loss of 54 Kobo or 0.12 per cent against the greenback yesterday to trade at N441.67/$1 compared with the preceding day’s rate of N441.13/$1, according to data from FMDQ Securities Exchange.

Business Post reports that the local currency shed weight during the session despite a decline in the value of forex transactions as traders carried out trades worth $68.51 million compared with the $108.56 million reported in the preceding session, indicating a day-on-day decline of $40.05 million or 36.9 per cent.

In the black market, the indigenous currency depreciated against its US counterpart by N5 or 0.67 per cent to close at N752/$1 in contrast to the previous day’s N747/$1.

Also, the local currency fell against the Pound Sterling in the interbank segment on Friday by 68 Kobo to finish at N492.25/£1 compared with Thursday’s N491.57/£1, according to data from the Central Bank of Nigeria and against the Euro, the Naira fell by N1.53 to quote at N429.15/€1 versus the previous day’s N427.62/€1.

A look at the digital currency market showed that Ripple (XRP) recorded the highest growth of 2.6 per cent yesterday to close at $0.4574, as Cardano (ADA) improved by 2.0 per cent to $0.3467.

Furthermore, Litecoin (LTC) gained 1.1 per cent to trade at $51.63, Ethereum (ETH) rose by 0.8 per cent to trade at $1,297.88, Dogecoin (DOGE) went up by 0.7 per cent to sell at $0.0592, Binance Coin (BNB) appreciated by 0.6 per cent to settle at $269.30, and Bitcoin (BTC) gained 0.5 per cent to quote at $19,147.02.

However, Solana (SOL) crashed by 1.4 per cent to trade at $38.27, while Binance USD (BUSD) and the US Dollar Tether (USDT) closed flat at $1.00 apiece.