Nigerian govt announces another currency reform as Naira falls to N486/dollar

The Federal Government on Monday announced another currency reform as Naira falls across foreign exchange markets in the country.

The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, told journalists in Abuja that Nigeria would henceforth adopt the flexible Investors and Exporter window rate for official transactions.

She said the government would start to use the flexible rate that has until now applied to investors and exporters for government transactions too.

Data obtained by the FMDQ Securities Exchange at the end of trading in the I&E window on Monday showed that the Naira closed at N410.13 to the dollar as against N410.05 per dollar on Friday. This represented a 0.012 percent drop in value.

Participants in the market bided for the dollar at N410 and N412 respectively.

The shortage of dollars was evident as daily forex turnover dropped by 44.30 percent from $46.43 million last Friday to $25.88 million on Monday.

At the black market, Naira closed at N486 per dollar compared to N485 on Friday, according to the data from Aboki FX.

Monday’s rate at the back market represented N1 or 0.21 percent devaluation from N485, its rate since March 12.

At the end of Monday’s trading, the difference in the exchange rate between the official and unofficial market stood at N75.87.