Naira remains stagnant against Dollar

The naira closed at 365 per United States dollar at the parallel market on Wednesday, the same rate it closed on Tuesday.

This was despite the Central Bank of Nigeria’s injection of $250m in the foreign exchange market on Tuesday.

The naira had traded flat at 365/dollar on Monday, having closed at 365/dollar on Friday. The Federal Government had declared Friday and Monday public holidays.

The CBN injected $250m into the various segments of the inter-bank foreign exchange market on Tuesday, in order to lift the naira against other major currencies.

The central bank had also last week reportedly injected $297m into the Retail Secondary Market Intervention Sales segment, raising the total intervention for the week to the sum of $547m.

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Out of the $250m injected on Tuesday, figures obtained from the CBN indicated that the Retail Secondary Market Intervention Sales segment of the market received the highest intervention with a total of $100m, the Small and Medium Enterprises window received a boost of $80m while the invisibles segment, comprising Business/Personal Travel Allowances, school tuition, medicals, among others, was allocated the sum of $70m to meet the demands of customers.

The bank’s spokesman, Isaac Okorafor, hinged the economy’s exit from recession to the regular intervention of the CBN in the forex market to boost liquidity in the market.

He added that the timely execution and settlement for eligible transactions as well as the forex available to the real sector and industrial capacities were factors that boosted the economy.

He recalled that the CBN Governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele, had a few months ago predicted that the Nigerian economy would be out of recession at the end of the third quarter.