Nigerian Currency Falls to N466/$1, N600/£1 at Black Market

By Adedapo Adesanya

The Naira recorded losses against both the United States Dollar and the British Pound Sterling at the black market segment of the foreign exchange (FX) market on Wednesday, November 11.

According to data on AbokiFX, a platform for tracking parallel forex market rates in Nigeria, at the close of transactions yesterday, the local currency closed weaker against the greenback by N1 to sell at N466/$1 in contrast to the N465/$1 it ended on Tuesday.

In the same vein, the Nigerian currency depreciated against the Pound by N4 at the parallel market to close at N600/£1 compared to N596/£1 of the prior session.

However, the domestic currency traded flat against the Euro during the midweek trading session to finish at N543/€1.

At the Investors and Exporters (I&E) window on Wednesday, the Nigerian legal tender suffered a 16 kobo or 0.04 per cent loss against the American currency to close at N385.83/$1 compared with N385.67/$1 it closed on Tuesday.

Business Post observed that the pressure on the Naira was too much to bear unlike in the previous trading day when it endured the burden from the demand for forex from customers.

Yesterday, the hunger for FX continued and it increased by 45.5 per cent or $64.1 million to $205.05 million from the previous day’s $140.95 million, according to data from the FMDQ Securities Exchange.

At the Bureaux De Change (BDC) segment, data from the Association of the Bureaux De Change Operators of Nigeria (ABCON) showed that the Naira/Dollar exchange rate remained unchanged at N386/$1 at the close of transactions on Wednesday.

Similarly, the exchange rate of the Naira to the United States Dollar at the interbank window yesterday remained unchanged at N379/$1.

Meanwhile, a look at the cryptocurrency market at the midweek session showed that Bitcoin appreciated by 3.4 per cent to N7,400,001.97 while Litecoin gained 3.6 per cent to sell for N28,370.94, with Ethereum (ETH) going up by 4.2 per cent to trade at N219,790.22.

Also, Dash (DASH) gained 4.5 per cent to trade at N33,438.00, while the US Dollar Tether (USDT) appreciated by 1.2 per cent to sell for N470.14. However, Ripple (RPX) fell by 0.3 per cent to sell at N119.51, while Tron (TRX) traded flat at N11.79.