Naira on Wednesday depreciated against the dollar across official and parallel foreign exchange (FX) markets.
Nigeria’s FX market resumed for the New Year on Tuesday, with Naira gaining against the dollar at the official market.
However, after trading on Wednesday Naira depreciated by 0.15 percent as the dollar was quoted at N461.67 as against the last close of N461.00 at the Investors and Exporters (I&E) forex window, data from the FMDQ indicated.
The naira’s weakness followed a low level of activity at the market as the daily foreign exchange market turnover declined by 54.82 percent to $69.33 million on Wednesday from $153.45 million recorded on Tuesday.
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Most currency dealers who participated in the FX auction on Wednesday maintained bids between N440.00 and N462.00 per dollar.
At the black market, traders revealed that the value of Naira was exchanged at N745 compared to N736/$1 on Tuesday, 3 January 2023.
Also, in the peer-to-peer market where most cryptocurrency and online traders buy dollars, Naira’s value dropped to N756 to dollar.
Meanwhile, Dr. Muda Yusuf, the Chief Executive Officer of the Center for the Promotion of Private Enterprise (CPPE) has predicted a continued devaluation of the Naira in 2023 except there is a review in policies.
According to him, there are key issues that need to be solved to ease pressure on Nigeria’s external reserves and provide enough liquidity in the market.