Naira maintains record low against US Dollar, trades at N1,050

In the early hours of Tuesday, the naira was trading at N1,040/$ in the P2P market and $1,050/$ in the black market.

At the spot market yesterday, the domestic currency fell by 1.82 per cent or N13.94 against the greenback to close at N778.80/$1 compared with last Friday’s value of N764.86/$1.

The International Monetary Fund said the naira is currently under pressure, and Nigeria is free to seek a loan from the Fund to stabilise the currency if it considers this a good option.

However, the Washington-based lender noted that the recent foreign exchange reforms and other measures taken by Nigerian authorities were appropriate.

The multinational financial agency also added that federal authorities should urgently tighten monetary policy and take measures to ensure that the market maintains full confidence in the CBN.

Tightening monetary policy will need to include raising monetary policy rates and eliminating excess naira liquidity.

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Consequently, the dollar index, which measures the US currency against its six major rivals, rose 0.1% to 106.3 after falling 0.36% on Monday.

Investors’ attention will be on US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, who will speak on Thursday in a busy week of speeches from regional bankers.

The CBN said it is committed to accelerating efforts to resolve the foreign exchange backlog with existing players and will continue dialogue with stakeholders to resolve the issue.

Eight years ago, the central bank gave importers of 43 banned goods the green light to access foreign exchange in the official market. On July 1, 2015, the CBN restricted the availability of foreign exchange to the import of 41 items that could be produced competitively in the economy.

Some of these items include rice, cement, margarine, palm oil/palm products/vegetable oils, meat and processed meat products, vegetables and processed vegetable products, poultry (chicken, eggs, turkey), private plane/jet, Indian incense, canned food (geisha/sardines), cold-rolled steel sheets, galvanized steel, and roofing sheets.

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