Naira under pressure at official market as FX scarcity persists

The Naira was under pressure against the US dollar in the foreign exchange (forex) market’s Investors and Exporters (I&E) and Peer-to-Peer (P2P) windows at the weekend.

According to FMDQ Securities Exchange data, the Nigerian Naira fell to a new low of N439.17/$1 after losing 0.58 per cent or N2.54 from the previous day’s rate of N436.63/$1.

The value of transactions in the spot market slightly went down by 1.0 per cent or $1.04 million to $99.70 million from the $100.74 million achieved a day earlier.

But in the P2P forex window, the value of the Nigerian currency against the Dollar appreciated by N2 to close at N741/$1 in contrast to N743/$1 and in the parallel market, the domestic currency closed flat at N731/$1.

In the interbank segment, the Naira gained N1.57 against the Pound Sterling to close at N487.34/£1 versus Thursday’s N488.91/£1, and against the Euro, it gained N2.22 to end the day at N425.87/€1 compared with the preceding session’s N428.09/€1.