external reserves has declined by USD4.722 billion, about 13.8 per cent, so far
this year.
The declining trend has been steady this year until middle of the year when it
reversed with CBN governor announcing a major jump to USD31.89 billion in
July.
However fresh pressure on the reserves had resumed as oil prices hit new lows,
a development which prompted the apex bank to renew restrictions on utilization
of foreign exchange across all segments of the foreign exchange markets in the
second half of the year.
The apex bank has also struggled to defend Naira exchange rate by supplying
foreign exchange directly to Bureau de Changes, BDCs and banks at controlled
exchange rate of N197/ USD1.0 and N199.07/ USD1.0 for its clearing rates and
inter-bank rates respectively.
But as a result of the sustained pressure on the external reserves and other
management bottlenecks the situation in the parallel market remained bleak
forcing Naira value down to N250/ USD1.0 last weekend. Even in the BDC
segment the local currency took a heat depreciating to N245/ USD1.0.
No comments:
Post a Comment