Naira Further Firms to N1,540.78/$1 at Official FX Market

By Adedapo Adesanya

The Naira appreciated yet again against the US Dollar in the Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEX) on Friday, September 27 to N1,540.78/$1 following recent injection into other segments of the market.

In the preceding session, the local currency firmed to N1,576.10/$1 before gaining another 2.24 per cent or N35.32 yesterday, according to data obtained from FMDQ Securities Exchange.

This was supported by FX liquidity from the central bank, though the value of forex turnover for the trading day went down by 36.4 per cent or $121.74 million to $212.31 million from the preceding day’s $334.05 million.

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) this week moved to stabilise the local currency by injecting FX into the Bureau de Change (BDCs) segment of the forex market. This has eased pressure on the official market, leading to a significant rise in the rates.

Meanwhile, the local currency was flat against the Pound Sterling and the Euro in the official forex market at the closing session of the week at N2,187.81/£1 and N1,822.82/€1, respectively.

However, in the parallel market, the domestic currency lost N5 against the dollar on Friday to sell at N1,695/$1 versus the preceding session’s N1,690/$1.

As for the digital currency market, the majority of the benchmarked tokens were in the mixed territory, with Ripple (XRP) growing by 2.1 per cent to settle at $0.6032. The coin has piqued the interest of traders following the reduction in interest rates by the US Federal Reserve, becoming a primary catalyst for the recovery of a large portion of cryptocurrencies.

Litecoin (LTC) which has also captured the attention of the crypto community with its impressive price record surged 1.7 per cent to close at $70.18 and Ethereum (ETH) rose by 0.2 per cent to $2,672.80.

On the flip side, Cardano (ADA) flipped 2.9 per cent to $0.3962, Dogecoin (DOGE) fell by 1.5 per cent to sell at $0.1223, Solana (SOL) slumped by 1.4 per cent to $155.89, Binance Coin (BNB) went down by 1.0 per cent to $600.92, and Bitcoin (BTC) declined by 0.1 per cent to $65,666.82, while the US Dollar Tether (USDT) and the US Dollar Coin (USDC) sold flat at $1.00 apiece.