Foreign Reserves tumble as Buhari leads Nigeria to Recession

Nigeria’s foreign exchange reserves fell 2.86 percent to $25.45 billion as at August 29.

The July figure was $26.20 billion latest data from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has showed. This is a decline of 18.9 percent from a year ago.

Also yesterday, the CBN sold dollar to some commercial lend­ers to support the local currency, which hit a fresh all-time low of 420 to the dollar on the unofficial market, the same day Africa’s big­gest economy officially slid into re­cession.

The currency traded at 418 to the dollar on Tuesday and has been un­der pressure on the black market for months.

The Naira closed at 306 to the dollar on the official window after the central bank dollar sales, re­versing losses in early traded which saw it quoted at 317.09 to the dollar, but fell compared with the 305.50 naira closed the previous day.

According to Reuters, bureaux de change operators raised hope of a gradual appreciation of the lo­cal currency in the near term as the central bank licensed 11 new inter­national money transfer operators to address the dollar supply side.

The President of Bureaux de Change Association, Aminu Gwadabe said: “Depending on the effective implementation of the central bank’s policy, the appoint­ment of new international money transfer operators will ensure that banks will have more dollars to sell to bureaux de change and provide the needed liquidity in the market.”

Gwadabe explained that CBN’s directive that commercial lenders should sell dollar inflow through money transfer operators to bu­rea.