By Adedapo Adesanya
The Naira depreciated against the United States Dollar for the third straight session at the Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEM) on Wednesday, September 5.
Data showed that the Nigerian currency weakened against the greenback during the session by 0.83 per cent or N13.53 to sell for N1,639.41/$1 in the official market versus Wednesday’s closing price of N1,625.88/$1.
Equally, the domestic currency depreciated against the British Pound Sterling in the spot market during the trading session by N5.69 to wrap the session at N2,135.37/£1, in contrast to the N2,129.68/£1 it was transacted at midweek.
Similarly, the local currency suffered a N7.14 loss against the Euro at NAFEX on Thursday to quote at N1,799.82/€1 compared with the previous day’s exchange rate of N1,792.68/€1.
The value of FX trades recorded at the spot market yesterday went down by 9.7 per cent or $19.97 million to $185.79 million from the $205.76 million posted on Wednesday.
Business Post reports that the value of the Nigerian currency declined against its American counterpart in the black market on Thursday by N10 to close at N1,650/$1 versus the N1,640/$1 it was traded a day earlier.
The Naira is weakening as the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has paused recent interventions to stabilise the foreign exchange market after it had promised to address the supply gap to ensure market stability. This will mark the third straight without an announcement of a sale in the market.
Meanwhile, the cryptocurrency market was largely negative with investors and traders going on a profit-taking spree that led to benchmarked tokens ending southwards.
Ripple (XRP) fell by 1.6 per cent to $0.5431, Solana (SOL) slumped by 1.4 per cent to trade at $130.19, Litecoin (LTC) recorded a 1.2 per cent loss to quote at $65.88, Bitcoin (BTC) dropped 0.9 per cent to sell for $56,377.69, Ethereum (ETH) slumped by 0.8 per cent to $2,378.28, and the US Dollar Tether (USDT) dwindled by 0.01 per cent to $0.9999.
Conversely, Dogecoin (DOGE) appreciated by 1.5 per cent to $0.0987, Cardano (ADA) rose by 0.9 per cent to $0.3249,, Binance Coin (BNB) went up by 0.4 per cent to trade at $506.49, and the US Dollar Coin (USDC) remained unchanged at $1.00.
