By Adedapo Adesanya
The Naira depreciated against the US Dollar in the Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEM) on Friday, October 20 as FX liquidity from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) remains frail.
In the official market, the domestic currency closed at N808.27/$1 after it lost N25.59 or 3.3 per cent from the preceding day’s exchange rate of N728.68/$1.
The value of FX transactions in the spot market went down by $18.21 million or 18.7 per cent to $79.26 million from the $97.47 million achieved on Thursday.
In the Peer-to-Peer (P2P) window of the forex market, the local currency appreciated against the Dollar on Friday by N1 to N1,064/$1, in contrast to the previous trading day’s rate of N1,065/$1.
Also, in the parallel market, the domestic currency improved its value against the greenback yesterday by N2 to sell at N1,153/$1 compared with the previous day’s N1,155/$1.
Similarly, the Naira was strengthened against the Pound Sterling in the official market during the trading session by N34.43 to trade at N1,010.92/£1 versus Thursday’s closing price of N1,045.35/£1 and on the Euro, the local currency gained N28.74 to close at N880.78/€1 versus the earlier day’s price of N909.52/€1
Meanwhile, the cryptocurrency market was bullish, with Solana (SOL) outperforming the rest of the digital coins, defying worries of a potential fire sale by bankrupt crypto exchange FTX. It jumped 6.2 per cent to trade at $27.95.
Further, Litecoin (LTC) appreciated by 1.6 per cent to trade at $63.95, Bitcoin (BTC) rose by 1.4 per cent to sell at $29,686.97, Dogecoin (DOGE) made a 1.3 per cent appreciation to quote at $0.0603, Cardano (ADA) added 1.2 per cent to finish at $0.2519, Ethereum (ETH) saw its value go up by 1.2 per cent to sell at $1,603.51, and Ripple (XRP) recorded a 0.5 per cent rise to end the day at $0.5155.
However, Binance Coin (BNB) fell by 0.2 per cent to sell for $212.52, while the US Dollar Tether (USDT) and Binance USD (BUSD) remained unchanged at $1.00 each.
Modupe Gbadeyanka