Naira Gains at Official Market, Loses at Black Market, Peer-to-Peer

By Adedapo Adesanya

Latest moves by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to bring stability and improve liquidity in the foreign exchange (FX) market paid off for the Naira on Thursday as its value appreciated against the US Dollar in the Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEM) at the close of transactions.

The Naira gained 0.34 per cent or N5.13 against the greenback during the session to quote at N1,498.25/$1, in contrast to the preceding day’s value of N1, 503.38/$1, according to data obtained from FMDQ Securities Exchange.

Against the Pound Sterling in the official market, the local currency maintained stability as it remained unchanged at N1,905.76/£1 and traded flat against the Euro at N1,625.53/€1.

The market had found comfort as the CBN continued efforts to stabilise the market, with the latest involving measures to keep FX in the system.

The apex bank prohibited authorised FX traders, particularly commercial banks, from disbursing cash to customers for Business Travel Allowance (BTA) and Personal Travel Allowance (PTA).

The CBN also stopped international oil companies (IOCs) operating in Nigeria from immediately remitting 100 per cent of their forex proceeds to their parent firms abroad. This means these firms can repatriate only 50 per cent of their proceeds abroad immediately while the other 50 per cent will be repatriated after 90 days.

As for the black market, the domestic currency lost N41 against the Dollar to sell at N1,605/$1, in contrast to the N1,564/$1 it traded in the midweek trading session.

Similarly, the Nigerian currency also depreciated against the American currency in the Peer-to-Peer (P2P) window by N31 to close at N1,597/$1 compared with Wednesday’s rate of N1,566/$1.

A look at the digital currency market showed that most of the benchmarked tokens tracked by Business Post ended in the green territory, with Ethereum (ETH) appreciating by 1.9 to $2,848.46, crossing $2,800 for the first time since May 2022.

Binance Coin (BNB) went up by 5.8 per cent to $361.57, Ripple (XRP) appreciated by 3.9 per cent to $0.5756, and Cardano (ADA) grew by 3.8 per cent to $0.6028.

On the flip side, Solana (SOL) slumped by 3.1 per cent to $113.67, Dogecoin (DOGE) shed 1.0 per cent to sell at $0.0863, Bitcoin (BTC) slid by 0.2 per cent to $52,175.47, and Litecoin (LTC) dropped 0.1 per cent to close at $70.39, while the US Dollar Tether (USDT) and the US Dollar Coin (USDC) remained flat at $1.00 apiece.