Naira Weakens at Peer-to-Peer, Strengthens at Official, Parallel Markets

By Adedapo Adesanya

The value of the Naira against the American Dollar weakened at the Peer-to-Peer (P2P) segment of the foreign exchange (forex) market on Wednesday, April 26, but was strengthened in the Investors and Exporters (I&E), and the parallel market sides of the forex market.

In the peer-to-peer, the Nigerian currency depreciated against its American counterpart by N2 to settle at N752/$1, in contrast to the N750/$1 it was exchanged on Tuesday.

But in the black market, the Naira appreciated against the greenback yesterday by N2 to trade at N734/$1 compared with the previous day’s exchange rate of N736/$1.

In the official market, the domestic currency appreciated by N1.31 or 0.38 per cent to quote at N462.13/$1 versus Tuesday’s value of N463.44/$1.

It was observed that the Naira withstood FX demand pressure it came under during the session as data from the FMDQ Securities Exchange showed that the value of forex trades rose by $57.28 million or 91.4 per cent to $119.97 million from the $62.69 million recorded in the preceding session.

However, the local currency was flat against the Pound Sterling and the Euro in the interbank segment of the forex market in the midweek session, closing at N572.99/£1 and N505.04/€1, respectively.

In the digital currency market, most of the tokens tracked by Business Post moved in different directions as investors continued to react to concerns over First Republic Bank after it was reported that customers withdrew around $100 billion in deposits from the lender last month.

Bitcoin (BTC) rose by 2.5 per cent to $29,026.16, Ethereum (ETH) appreciated by 2.2 per cent to trade at $1,907.32, and Cardano (ADA) grew by 3.1 per cent to $0.4084.

But Litecoin (LTC) lost 2.3 per cent to close at $89.04, Binance Coin (BNB) went down by 1.5 per cent to $323.76, Ripple (XRP) slumped by 1.3 per cent to $0.4632, Solana (SOL) dropped 0.6 per cent to trade at $21.77, and Dogecoin (DOGE) shrank by 0.1 per cent to sell at $0.08016, while Binance USD (BUSD) and the US Dollar Tether (USDT) remained unchanged at $1.00 apiece.