The Central Bank of Nigeria reports an inflow of over $1.5 billion in recent days, indicating successful monetary policy initiatives.
The Bank’s Acting Director, Corporate Communications Department, Hakama Ali, made the claim on Thursday, noting that statistics available to the bank suggested that the inflows were the result of a deliberate effort to stabilize the foreign exchange market.
According to her, the naira has continued to strengthen in the Autonomous Foreign Exchange market, trading at N1,309/$1 versus N1,611/$1 in the second week of March 2024.
While noting that Thursday’s rate indicated that the naira was heading in the correct direction, she underlined that the CBN, led by Yemi Cardoso, was dedicated to market stability and appropriate naira pricing against other major currencies internationally.
The development follows the CBN’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) decision of a two-percent increase in its benchmark rate, from 22.75 percent to 24.75 percent, on March 26, 2024.
During his post-meeting briefing, Governor Olayemi Cardoso emphasized that the CBN had cleared all verified foreign exchange backlogs, indicating that liquidity would improve in the foreign exchange market.
On March 27, 2024, the Bank auctioned N1.64 trillion in Nigerian Treasury Bills (NTBs) at stop rates of 16.24%, 17%, and 21.124% for the 91-day, 182-day, and 364-day tenors, respectively.
