CBN supplies $494.2m, CNY36M into forex market in one week

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) addressed the needs of end-users in the inter-bank market and the retail Secondary Market Intervention Sales (SMIS), by injecting a total of $494.2m and CNY36M (Chinese Yuan) into foreign exchange market in one week.

A breakdown of the intervention shows that in the latest round of mediation in the inter-bank foreign exchange market, the CBN injected the sum of $284.2 million in the Retail Secondary Market Intervention Sales (SMIS).

This is in addition to CNY36.0 million in the spot and short-tenured forwards

segment of the inter-bank foreign market.

The United States dollarsdenominated transactions were to meet requests in the agricultural and raw materials sectors, while those in Chinese Yuan were for Renminbi-denominated Letters of Credit.

The forex intervention has helped to shore up the dollar liquidity as well as contributed to maintaining stability in the market, analysts opined.

Consequently, a dollar exchanged for N357 on the selling side (Bureau De Change) while it remained at N360 on the buying side (customers).

However, naira depreciated by marginally 0.02 percent to close at N361.97k per dollar on Friday compared to N361.91k/$ traded the previous day, data from FMDQ indicated.

Also within last week, precisely on Tuesday, July 23, 2019, the CBN intervened in the inter-bank sector of the foreign exchange market with the sum of $210 million.

In this forex auction, authorized dealers in the wholesale sector of the market received $100 million, while the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMES) and the Invisibles segments were allocated the sum of $55 million each.

Isaac Okorafor, director, corporate communications department, said the Bank’s management remained particularly pleased with the prevailing stability in the Nigerian foreign exchange market.