Relief as Naira Gains N9 to Trade at N493/$1 at Black Market

By Adedapo Adesanya

There was a relief at the unregulated segment of the foreign exchange (FX) market on Thursday after days of anxiety caused by hoarding and panic buying.

The Nigerian currency strongly appreciated against the United States Dollar at the black market yesterday by N9 to trade at N493/$1 in contrast to the previous value of N502/$1.

Business Post reports that the local currency was strengthened at the parallel market during the session as a result of a sufficient supply of FX at the regulated forex markets.

This made the demand for the hard currency on the street to be very low, prompting the value to fall during the trading session, according to information gathered by this newspaper.

Also, the Naira appreciated against the British Pound Sterling at the same parallel market on Thursday by N3, closing at N710/£1 compared with N713/£1 it was sold on Wednesday.

In the same vein, the domestic currency appreciated by N6 against the Euro at the black market to trade at N600/€1 in contrast to N606/£1 of the preceding day.

At the Investors and Exporters (I&E) window, the Nigerian Naira appreciated against its American counterpart on Thursday by 50 kobo or 0.12 per cent to end the session at N411.50/$1 versus N412/$1 it closed on Wednesday.

Yesterday, the I&E space witnessed an increase in turnover by $6.34 million or 4.8 per cent to $138.20 million from $131.86 million recorded the day before.

But at the interbank segment of the market, the Nigerian currency depreciated against the American Dollar by 9 kobo or 0.02 per cent to close at N410.21/$1 in contrast to the previous day’s N410.12/$1.

Meanwhile, calm returned to the cryptocurrency market yesterday as six out of the seven tokens tracked finished in the bullish territory as only the Bitcoin (BTC) went southwards by 0.3 per cent to trade at N19,450,299.90.

The Ethereum (ETH) appreciated by 1.7 per cent to sell at N1,220,000.00, Ripple (XRP) gained 0.2 per cent to trade at N422.00, while the Dash (DASH) improved by 2.4 per cent to trade at N81,009.00.

Further, Litecoin (LTC) gained 1.9 per cent to trade at N83,519.05, Tron (TRX) rose by 3.3 per cent to sell at N35.98, while the US Dollar Tether (USDT) appreciated by 1.2 per cent to quote at N505.02.