Foreign Investor Increases Stake in Okomu Oil

By Adedapo Adesanya Nigeria’s Minister of Finance, Mr Wale Edun, has said the country is unable to clear up to $6.8 billion of overdue forward payments in the foreign exchange market, noting that this is preventing the Naira from gaining stability. Speaking in an interview on Thursday, Mr Edun lamented that the country’s FX market is facing a serious liquidity crisis due to low flows. “The issue we have now is that the market is not liquid enough,” he said in an interview in New York, per Bloomberg. The Minister said that resolving the overdue contracts would allow the Naira

By Adedapo Adesanya The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has postponed the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting scheduled to hold next week. In a statement, the apex bank noted that the MPC meeting, which was supposed to take place on Monday, September 25 and Tuesday, September 26, 2023, has been postponed until further notice. This is coming less than a week after President Bola Tinubu nominated Mr Olayemi Michael Cardoso to take over the role from Mr Folashodun Shonubi, who is filling the role following the ousting of Mr Godwin Emefiele, who is currently held in the custody of the

By Dipo Olowookere Stock investors were swayed by the news of the indefinite postponement of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). The quarterly rate decision meeting was supposed to occur next week, but it has been moved forward. There are speculations that the meeting was postponed to allow the new CBN Governor nominee, Mr Yemi Cardoso, to preside over the gathering. He is yet to be confirmed by the Senate, which resumes from a recess next Tuesday, the same day the rate decision is supposed to be announced. The confusion as to who

By Dipo Olowookere It was bearish market for treasury bills on Tuesday, a day after the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) floated an unexpected Open Market Operations (OMO), where it sold the debt instruments worth over N250 billion to market players. At yesterday’s session, the apex bank did not approach the market for another mop up of liquidity in the financial system as traders anticipate the maturing of T-bills worth N315.99 billion via the secondary market on Thursday as well as inflow of the recently disbursed FAAC allocation of N693.53 billion. Business Post observed that yields increased across most maturities

By Dipo Olowookere The Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) has maintained that it would go on with the planned crackdown on vehicle owners who failed to pay duties on their cars, despite having them registered by various government agencies involved in the registration process. Addressing a press conference on Wednesday, spokesman of the Customs, Mr Joseph Attah, said the grace period for vehicle owners to make the payment to avoid being embarrassed remains Monday, March 13 to Wednesday, April 12, 2017. He said points of payments with the exception of Lagos and Port Harcourt will now be the nearest Customs Area

By Ahmed Rahma In order to meet the current demand of its consumers, Nigerian Breweries Plc has expanded its manufacturing footprint with the acquisition of a new ultra-modern automated PET bottling line worth N5.1 billion. According to a statement by the brewing company, the PET bottling line launched at the Ijebu Ode plant is designed with the latest technology that meets world-class safety and quality standards and is expected to produce 24,000 bottles per hour. Speaking at the event, the Chairman of Nigerian Breweries, Mr Kola Jamodu, stated that, “The construction of the production line was conceived in order to

By Modupe Gbadeyanka At the 24th Annual General Meeting (AGM) of Eterna Plc held in Lagos, shareholders of the firm expressed their satisfaction with the payment of dividend to them for last year. They said despite the unfavourable environment the petroleum products marketing firm operated in in 2016, it still endeavoured to perform well and even declared dividend to shareholders. During the meeting, the shareholders approved the payment of 30 kobo proposed by the board of company. They applauded the board of directors of Eterna Plc for steering the ship of the firm to success, assuring the board of their

By Dipo Olowookere One of the underwriting companies operating in Nigeria, Wapic Insurance Plc, said it has already received the approvals of the regulatory authorities to begin its proposed bancassurance business model. A bancassurance model allows an insurer to have a mutually beneficial strategic partnership with a bank for the sale of its insurance products to the bank’s customers. It is believed that if this initiative goes well as planned by the board and management of the organisation, it would increase the revenue of Wapic Insurance because of the relationship its directors have with Access Bank Plc, one of the

By Modupe Gbadeyanka The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) again on Tuesday released the sum of $210 million to authorized traders in the foreign exchange market in the country. This was to sustain the liquidity level at the market as some foreign portfolio investors continue to request for greenback as they exit the Nigerian capital market due to declining yields and uncertainties. The sale of forex to traders on Tuesday came after a similar exercise was done last Friday, where the CBN injected the sum of $321.11 million and CNY33.3 million into the Retail Secondary Market Intervention Sales (SMIS) segment

By Modupe Gbadeyanka Ahead of the release of its financial statements for the half year ended June 30, 2019, the board of MTN Nigeria Communications Plc will meet to consider the results. The telecommunications company said in a disclosure today that this meeting will take place on Wednesday, July 24, 2019. At the meeting, the second highest decision-making organ of the firm will consider and approve the unaudited financial statements for the six months ended June 30, 2019 along with other agenda items. “This is to inform the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) and investing public that a meeting of the

By Modupe Gbadeyanka Former national legal adviser of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Mr Muiz Banire, has been confirmed as Chairman of the Governing Board of Assets Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON). Mr Banire, a former Commissioner in Lagos and a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) was confirmed for the position on Wednesday by the Senate. At the plenary today, Senate’s Chairman on Banking, Insurance and Other Financial Institutions Committee, Mr Rafiu Ibrahim, informed his colleagues that Mr Banire was qualified to hold the post having been screened by his committee. When the Senate President, Mr Bukola Saraki, asked