Yemisi Izuora
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has again made interventions in the inter-bank sector of the Foreign Exchange market with the injection of $210 million into three segments of the market on Tuesday, February 27, 2018.
A breakdown of the Bank’s latest round of intervention indicates that the CBN offered the sum of $100 million to dealers in the wholesale window, while those in the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) window received an allocation of $55 million. The invisibles segment, comprising Business/Personal Travel Allowances, school tuition, medicals, etc., was also allocated the sum of $55 million.
The CBN spokesman, Isaac Okorafor, in disclosing these, said the Bank would continue to make the interventions, in spite of the fact that the country’s reserve has enjoyed accretion in the past weeks, bringing the figure to about $42billion.
Okorafor was upbeat that the Bank’s forex management strategy was yielding the desired result; hence, he noted that the CBN would continue to sustain its activities in the market in order to maintain stability and liquidity.
Speaking on the goal of convergence between the rates at the inter-bank and Bureau de Change (BDC) segments, he said the CBN was working hard to achieve the objective and expressed belief that the rates in both markets would eventually merge in due course.
Meanwhile, the naira continued to maintain its stability in the FOREX market, exchanging at an average of N360/$1 in the BDC segment of the market on Tuesday, February 27, 2018.