Naira Steadies Across FX Market Segments as Bitcoin Sells Above N24.7m

By Ahmed Rahma, Adedapo Adesanya

The Naira was relatively stable against other currencies across all the tracked segments at the foreign exchange market on Tuesday, February 16.

The domestic currency closed at N409.67/$1 at the Investors and Exporters (I&E) segment of the market, the same rate it traded at the previous session.

Also at the regulated window of the FX market, according to data obtained from the FMDQ Securities Exchange, there was an uptick in the day’s turnover.

Business Post reports that transactions worth $30.44 million were recorded at the segment compared to the previous session’s $28.21 million, indicating an increase by $2.23 million or 7.9 per cent.

At the Bureaux De Change (BDC) window, the rate of the Naira to the Dollar remained unchanged yesterday at N395/$1 and at the interbank segment, the Naira traded flat against the US Dollar at N379/$1.

In the same vein, there was no price movement for the domestic currency against the greenback at the parallel market on Tuesday as the former closed at N473/$1.

Also, the local currency traded flat against the Pound Sterling at the same unregulated market window yesterday at N652/£1 and also remained unchanged against the Euro at N570/€1.

A look at the cryptocurrency market on Tuesday showed that despite facing regulatory embargo in Nigeria, the trading of the digital coins continues, allowing the currencies to surge.

During the session, the most popular digital currency, Bitcoin (BTC), crossed the N24 million mark as it sold for N24,754,847.35, according to data sourced from Quidax, a platform used for trading cryptocurrencies in Naira in Nigeria.

Furthermore, Ethereum (ETH) gained 1.8 per cent to close at N890,000, Litecoin (LTC) went up by 3.1 per cent to settle at N106,142.01, Tron (TRX) sold for N26.14 after going up 1.6 per cent, while the United States Dollar Tether (USDT) grew by 1.1 per cent to trade at N486.20.

However, the Ripple (RPX) shed 4.4 per cent to quote at N264.89, while the Dash (DASH) scraped off 0.1 per cent to sell for N128,469.85.