Naira gains over Pound, Euro at parallel market

The Naira, at the end of Thursday’s foreign exchange trading activities, appreciated slightly against the Pound Sterling and Euro at the closing rates of 475 compared to 476 exchanged on Wednesday and 425 against 426 sold per Euro on the same period at the parallel market.

Although, the local currency, was seen unchanged at 364 per dollar at the parallel market as well, as well at 305.90 to the US Dollar at the official forex market.

However, the Importer & Exporter FX widow, relapsed a bit with opening rate of 359.97 weaker than 359.66 sold on Wednesday and N359.51 recorded on Tuesday, but was unchanged at 360.65 sold the previous day, but lower than 359.87 declared earlier in the week.

The special window, also, recorded a decline daily turnover of $214.84 million against $234.2m traded on Wednesday, however, better than $78.5m transacted on Tuesday, but lower than $346.90m sold on Monday.

Meanwhile, the I&E FX window recorded $14.69 billion in four months, between July and September 2017, as Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) continued to bridge the gap between parallel market and official market rates.

In our fact findings, we observed that I&E FX in October rose by 7.3 per cent to $4.53 billion from $4.22bn in September 2017. In E & FX window for August moved to $3.68bn, an increase of 62.8 per cent from $2.26bn in July.

FMDQ OTC had reported that 10 commercial bank traded N70.88trillion overall turnover on the FMDQ OTC Securities Exchange between January to September 2017.

Meanwhile, the apex bank has defended the local currency with $4.8bn between July and October this year.
Data gathered by our correspondent revealed that the apex bank highest intervention in four months under review was $1.5bn in August, followed by $1.37bn in October.

The CBN had defended the Naira with $1.2bn and $727.5m in September and July of 2017, respectively.
For the first three months, the CBN’s $1.37bn in October comprises of $400m in whole sale; $200m in Small and medium enterprises (SMEs); $180m in invisibles; $306.3m in SMIS, and $285.70m in agriculture, airlines, petroleum, and raw materials segments.

In September, the apex bank injected $485m to Retail Secondary Market; SMEs, $300 million; invisibles $255m and $200m, to wholesale segments

The bulk of the disbursement totaling $561m in August was injected to the clearance of the backlog of matured foreign exchange obligations for raw materials and machineries for manufacturing companies, agricultural chemicals, and airlines – was for Retail Secondary Market Intervention Sales (SMIS), while the balance went to settling
wholesale, $500m; SMEs, $235m, and invisible $200m, demands.

The CBN’s Acting Director, Corporate Communications Department, Mr. Isaac Okorafor continued to reiterate that its intervention was in line with the CBN’s commitment to continue to ensure foreign exchange liquidity and meet legitimate demand.

Motolani Oseni