From Uche Usim, Abuja

In what has become a sustained intervention, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on Monday, fortified the nation’s foreign exchange market for greater offshore transactions with additional injection of $195 million. 

The money covers three segments of the market. 

In the wholesale segment of the inter-bank forex market, the CBN auctioned $100 million and also intervened in the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and invisible segments, with the sum of $50 million and $45million respectively.  The Acting Director, Corporate Communications Department, Mr. Isaac Okorafor, while responding to media enquiries, noted that during seasons when there are pressures on the market from those seeking forex for school fees and vacations, the Bank has resolved to keep faith with its promise of sustaining forex  liquidity in the market and ensuring that genuine requests for it were met, as well as improving liquidity and flexibility in the market. 

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“This comes on the heels of last week’s intervention in which the retail secondary market intervention sales (SMIS) received the largest allocation of $264,192,252.95 and the authorised dealers in the wholesale window had the sum of $100,000,000”, Okorafor stated.  

Recall that last week, the CBN, in its resolve to improve foreign exchange availability in the Nigerian forex market and ameliorate challenges encountered by critical stakeholders, announced that payment for port charges to the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) and other agencies by oil marketing companies would henceforth be accommodated by the Bank using Form ‘A’.  

“It is hoped that the move by the CBN would go a long way in speeding up operations at the ports, thereby enhancing the ease of doing business in the country”, the CBN Spokesman added.