Naira Weakens at Spot Market to N463.02/$1

By Adedapo Adesanya

The Naira depreciated against the US Dollar in the Investors and Exporters (I&E) window of the foreign exchange market on Wednesday, May 10, trading at N463.02/$1.

According to data obtained from FMDQ Securities Exchange, this indicated that the local currency recorded a 77 kobo or 0.17 per cent loss as it was transacted on Tuesday at the spot market at N462.25/$1.

It was observed that the Nigerian currency came under pressure yesterday as a result of a significant increase in the demand for forex at the official market.

The turnover for the trading session was $178.68 million, 80.8 per cent or $79.84 million higher than the $98.84 million recorded in the preceding session.

Also, in the black market, the domestic currency depreciated against the Dollar in the midweek session by N2, closing at N741/$1, in contrast to the previous day’s N739/$1.

However, at the Peer-2-Peer (P2P) segment, the local currency closed flat against the American currency yesterday at N752/$1.

In the interbank segment, the Naira appreciated against the Pound Sterling during the midweek session by N2.25 to close at N580.89/£1 versus Tuesday’s rate of N580.89/£1 and gained N3.28 to end the day at N505.41/€1 versus N508.69/€1.

The cryptocurrency market, on its part, recorded a mixed movement across the benchmarked tokens tracked by Business Post as prices fell in the US last month, helping drive inflation to its lowest rate in two years.

Inflation, the pace at which prices rise, was 4.9 per cent in the 12 months to April, official figures show.

That was down from 5 per cent in March and marks the tenth month in a row that price rises have slowed.

The fall comes after the US central bank sharply raised interest rates to try to control inflation which peaked last June at 9.1 per cent – the highest it has been since 1981.

Bitcoin (BTC) lost 0.9 per cent to $27,440.51, Ethereum (ETH) also slid 0.9 per cent to $1,827.64, Dogecoin (DOGE) shed 0.8 per cent to sell at $0.0727, Solana (SOL) recorded a 0.4 per cent slump to trade at $20.63, Binance Coin (BNB) also went down by 0.4 per cent to $312.00, and Ripple (XRP) dropped 0.2 per cent to trade at $0.4286.

But Litecoin (LTC) improved by 0.7 per cent to $80.33, Cardano (ADA) rose by 0.1 per cent to $0.365, while Binance USD (BUSD) and the US Dollar Tether (USDT) closed flat at $1.00 apiece.