Devaluation Fears Ease as Naira Appreciates Against Dollar

By Adedapo Adesanya

The Naira gained against the United States Dollar at the Peer-to-Peer (P2P), Investors and Exporters (I&E), and the parallel market segments of the foreign exchange (forex) market on Thursday, December 22.

The value of the domestic currency improved at the various FX windows yesterday as fears over the devaluation of the Naira eased, though investors believe that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has already done this.

In the P2P forex window, the value of the Nigerian currency rose against the US Dollar yesterday by N15 to quote at N763/$1 compared with Wednesday’s rate of N778/$1.

Also, at the spot market, the Naira pulled an 8 Kobo or 0.02 per cent gain against the greenback to close at N456.25/$1 compared with the previous rate of N456.33/$1.

Yesterday, the value of forex transactions dropped by 70.5 per cent or $266.11 million to $111.37 million from the preceding day’s $377.48 million, according to data from FMDQ Securities Exchange.

In the parallel market, the exchange rate of the Naira to the American Dollar was strengthened by N2 as it closed at N744/$1, in contrast to the midweek session’s value of N746/$1.

In the interbank segment, the Naira witnessed no movement against both the Pound Sterling and the Euro at the exchange rate remained intact at N541.25/£1 and N474.40/€1, respectively.

The cryptocurrency market continued its mixed outcome on Thursday as the 10 cryptos tracked by Business Post closed in different directions.

Leading the gainers was Dogecoin (DOGE), which jumped by 4.3 per cent to trade at $0.0766, and was trailed by Cardano (ADA), which recorded a 1.4 per cent increase to sell at $0.2546.

Ripple (XRP) saw a 1.1 per cent growth to trade at $0.3482, and Ethereum (ETH) improved by 0.4 per cent to sell at $1,216.22.

Binance Coin (BNB) led the losers as it recorded a 0.9 per cent depreciation to trade at $244.82, followed by Solana (SOL), which slid by 0.8 per cent to sell at $11.92. Litecoin (LTC) dropped 0.08 per cent to trade at $65.64, while Bitcoin (BTC) slumped by 0.04 per cent to sell at $16,791.27.

In the flat territory were Binance USD (BUSD) and the US Dollar Tether (USDT), which retained parity in their values at $1.00 each.