As the Central Bank of Nigeria continues to pump in dollars in the inter-bank foreign exchange market, the naira has yet to make any noticeable improvement.
Naira and dollar
Despite the sale of the sum of $536m on Friday and Monday by the Central Bank of Nigeria, the naira depreciated against the dollar by closing at 363 per United States dollar at the parallel market on Monday.
On Monday, the central bank also intervened in the inter-bank foreign exchange market with the sum of $210m to meet customers’ requests in various segments of the market on Monday.
This was in addition to the $325.64m retail Secondary Market Intervention Sales made by the regulator on Friday.
The retail SMIS were meant to meet requests in the agricultural, airlines, petroleum products and raw materials and machinery sectors.
The CBN said Monday’s sale was in line with its determination to meet the customers’ needs in the sundry segments of the market.
The CBN offered $100m to authorised dealers in the wholesale segment of the market, while the Small and Medium Enterprises segment got the sum of $55m.