SAN FRANCISCO, May 05, (THEWILL) – The retail segment of the interbank forex market received a huge boost on Friday, May 5, 2017, as the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) intervened with a total sum of $388.66 million sold to authorized dealers in that sector of the market.
Friday’s figures were the results of the bids submitted by dealers since Tuesday, May 2, 2017.
Confirming the numbers, the Acting Director, Corporate Communications Department at the CBN, Isaac Okorafor, disclosed that the sum of $87.885 was for spot sales, while $300.8 million was sold as forwards.
Okorafor further explained that the forwards were sold into three tenors of 30, 45 and 60 days respectively. According to him, the Bank sold $100.95 as 30-day forwards; $110.48 million as 45-day forwards and $99.37 as 60-day forwards.
While also confirming that the Bank continued with its intervention in the Bureau de Change (BDC) segment of the market to meet the needs of low-end users, the spokesman said the Bank remained resolute in ensuring that it supplies enough forex to genuine customers and in the process sustain liquidity in the market.
With this development, he expressed hope that the CBN will inch even much closer to its objective of convergence of the rates in the interbank and BDC segments.
The dollar was quoted on the streets at N390 – $1.
THEWILL recalls that the CBN in the course of the week intervened in the wholesale and invisibles segments of the market with amounts valued at over $346 million to ease access to foreign exchange by different categories of customers.
Meanwhile, banks and other authorized dealers again failed to fully subscribe to the sum of $150 million offered by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on Thursday, May 4, 2017.
The news filtering from the apex Bank indicate that the dealers could only pick the sum of $43.5 million, which represents 29 per cent of the $150 million offered for subscription in the wholesale segment of the foreign exchange market.
Confirming this development, the apex Bank’s spokesman, Isaac Okorafor, reaffirmed the Bank’s position to sustain the intervention with a view to making foreign exchange available for all genuine transactions eligible for foreign exchange through the CBN window.
Mr. Okorafor also allayed the fear over the dwindling subscription by authorized dealers noting that the development merely goes to confirm the extent of liquidity in the foreign exchange market and the determination of the CBN to sustain the intervention aimed at ensuring stability in the market.
Meanwhile, the operators in the Bureau D’ Change segment of the market were also on hand on Thursday to pick the $20,000 offered to service the low end foreign exchange users.
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