CBN Boosts FOREX Market With $210m

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), on Tuesday, May 8, 2018, boosted the inter-bank Foreign Exchange market with another sum of $210 million.
The Bank again offered the sum of $100 million to authorized dealers in the wholesale segment of the market. The Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) segment received the sum of $55 million while the sum of $55 million was apportioned to invisibles such as tuition fees, medical payments and Basic Travel Allowance (BTA).
A statement from the Bank’s Acting Director, Corporate Communications Department, Mr. Isaac Okorafor, confirmed the figures and reiterated CBN’s capacity to continue to sustain the foreign exchange intervention.
Mr. Okorafor urged authorized dealers to help sustain the confidence in the foreign exchange market by continuing to honour requests from customers with genuine needs.
It will be recalled that the Central Bank of Nigeria last Friday, May 4, 2018 intervened in the Secondary Market Intervention Sales (SMIS) to the tune of $349.34m.
Meanwhile, the Naira, on Tuesday, May 8, 2018, continued to maintain its stability in the FOREX market, exchanging at an average of N362/$1 in the BDC segment of the market.

Mr Isaac Okoroafor said the continued interventions were in line with CBN’s pledge to sustain market liquidity in order to boost production and trade. Okoroafor said that the amount released was for requests in the agriculture, airlines, petroleum products and raw materials, and machinery sectors. According to Okoroafor, the feedback from the wholesale and retail segments of the Nigerian Foreign Exchange markets showed that customers are satisfied with their level of access to foreign exchange. He also assured Nigerians that the recent confirmation of Deputy Governors and Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) nominees by the Senate would further spur the bank toward taking sound decisions needed for economic development.