Naira Makes Further Parallel Market Gains

Nigerian currency, The Naira has extended its gains on the parallel market on Tuesday.

Gatekeepers News reports that the currency closed at N508 to a dollar, stronger than the N512 to a dollar it ended the previous day, Monday.

The new rate represent an appreciation by N17 in one week on the parallel market, after the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) ended the sale of the US dollars to Bureau De Change (BDC) operators.

Market watchers attributed the development to increase forex supply in the system as well as measures to address arbitrage in the market.

CBN on Monday said the speculations that it was planning to convert the foreign exchange (FX) in domiciliary accounts of bank customers into naira was untrue.

The bank further assured members of the public that it would monitor the commercial banks to ensure they meet the legitimate FX demands of customers.

The bank’s Acting Director in charge of Corporate Communications, Osita Nwanisobi, dismissed insinuations in some quarters that the central bank planned to convert FX in the domiciliary accounts of customers into naira in order to check purported shortage of availability of the dollars.

He stressed that the CBN never planned to tamper with the FX deposits in the accounts of customers, adding that those making such allegations were criminal speculators whose intention was to create panic in the foreign exchange market.

The CBN director insisted that at no time did the bank ever suggested or implied that it would tinker with the FX deposits of customers.

He, therefore, urged operators of domiciliary accounts and other members of the banking public to go about their legitimate FX transactions and disregard fictitious stories aimed at pitching them against the bank and triggering chaos in the system.