By Adedapo Adesanya
The Naira depreciated against the United States Dollar in the black market on Monday, January 30, 2023, by N2 to close at N752/$1 compared with the preceding session’s N750/$1.
Equally, in the interbank window, the local currency depreciated against the Pound Sterling on Monday by N2.60 to finish at N570.05/£1 versus last Friday’s rate of N567.45/£1, and against the Euro, it lost 69 Kobo to sell at N501.42/€1 compared with the preceding session’s N500.73/€1.
However, the Nigerian currency appreciated against its American counterpart in the Investors and Exporters (I&E) window of the foreign exchange (forex) market during the session by 25 Kobo or 0.05 per cent to trade at N461.50/$1, in contrast to last Friday’s value of N461.75/$1.
The local currency was strengthened yesterday despite coming under FX pressure as the value of transactions jumped by 54.1 per cent or $52.82 million to $150.49 million from $97.67 million.
Also, in the Peer-to-Peer (P2P) segment of the market, the domestic currency gained N1 against the greenback to settle at N759/$1, in contrast to the previous session’s exchange rate of N760/$1.
Meanwhile, the crypto market was under pressure on Monday as traders de-risked ahead of the Federal Reserve’s Wednesday announcement of a possible hike to interest rates.
Cardano (ADA) declined during the session by 4.6 per cent to finish at $0.3733, Ripple (XRP) dropped 4.2 per cent to trade at $0.3927, Solana (SOL) slumped by 4.1 per cent to settle at $24.15, Ethereum (ETH) went down by 3.9 per cent to close at $1,573.60, Bitcoin (BTC) crashed by 3.5 per cent to end at $22,901.11, Binance Coin (BNB) shrank by 1.7 per cent to trade at $309.86, and Litecoin (LTC) depreciated by 1.5 per cent to quote at $93.87.
But the value of Dogecoin (DOGE) shot up by 3.7 per cent yesterday to sell at $0.0924, while the US Dollar Tether (USDT) and Binance USD (BUSD) remained unchanged at the close of transactions at $1.00 each.
Dipo Olowookere