The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on Friday intervened in the Retail Secondary Market Sales (SMIS) to tune of $334,146,393.84 and another sum of CNY 52,106,614.35 to boo the liquidity of the forex market.
The apex bank’s Director of Corporate Communications, Isaac Okorafor, said that the interventions were intended to ensure adequate liquidity in the market as well as to meet its obligations in the Bi-lateral Currency Swap Agreement with the Peoples’ Bank of China (PBoC).
According to him, the dollar-denominated interventions were to meet forex requests for agricultural and machinery needs, while the Yuan denominated intervention were for spots and short-tenored forwards.
Okorafor pointed out that the apex bank’s management was pleased with the performance of the naira against the United States dollar and other major currencies around the world, given the fact that currencies of many other emerging economies were struggling against the US dollar.
In addition, he confirmed that the management expressed satisfaction that the Bank’s intervention had largely eased pressure on the country’s foreign reserve.
Okorafor promised the determination of the CBN to sustain stability in the forex market through continued monitoring of authorised dealers in order to check incidences of sharp practices.
Meanwhile, the Naira maintained its exchange rate against major international currencies traded on Friday, exchanging for N361/$1 in the BDC segment of the market.
