By Adedapo Adesanya
It was not a pleasant day for the Naira in the Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEX) segment of the FX market on Tuesday as its value further depreciated against the United States Dollar by 0.03 per cent or 46 Kobo to settle at N1,509.45/$1 compared with the previous day’s rate of N1,508.99/$1.
Also, the domestic currency weakened against the Pound Sterling in the spot market during the trading session by N55.48 to sell for N1,914.58/£1 compared with Monday’s closing value of N1,859.10/£1 and against the Euro, it lost N50.63 to quote at N1,624.42/€1 versus the preceding day’s N1,573.79/€1.
The Nigerian currency suffered losses in the official forex window amid an increase in Nigeria’s foreign exchange reserves which hit $34.14 billion after the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) ordered all banks to deposit all excess FX to its branches in Lagos and Abuja.
It was observed that the supply of forex to the market broadly increased by 74.4 per cent or $91.00 million yesterday to $213.31 million from the $122.31 million achieved a day earlier.
Business Post reports that in the black market, the Naira depreciated against the greenback on Tuesday by N5 to trade at N1,515/$1, in contrast to Monday’s closing value of N1,510/$1.
Meanwhile, the cryptocurrency market turned bearish yesterday, with Bitcoin (BTC) falling by 3.5 per cent to trade at $60,885.84 due to profit-taking after slight inflows into US spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and the German Government’s transfer of 1,500 BTC valued at $94.7 million potentially triggering a minor correction in BTC price before an anticipated upward rally in the coming days.
Ethereum (ETH) lost 2.8 per cent to finish at $3,357.35, Binance Coin (BNB) went down by 1.7 per cent to $568.33, Dogecoin (DOGE) depreciated by 1.3 per cent to $0.1221, the US Dollar Tether (USDT) slumped by 0.05 per cent to $0.9985 and the US Dollar Coin (USDC) fell by 0.03 per cent to $0.9998.
However, Cardano (ADA) appreciated by 1.9 per cent to $0.4185, Litecoin (LTC) rose by 1.1 per cent to sell at $75.30, Solana (SOL) jumped by 0.8 per cent to trade at $150.26, and Ripple (XRP) gained 0.3 per cent to settle at $0.4797.
