Naira Trades at Record Low Against Global Counterparts

Naira remained at a record-low against its global counterparts on the parallel market, popularly referred to as the black market.

The local currency traded at N611 against the British Pound, its lowest in more than four years.

Against the Euro common currency, the Nigerian Naira plunged to N552 per Euro on the parallel market. Again, the lowest in over four years.

Global economic uncertainties continued to pressure the Nigerian Naira as investors and businesses struggle to access foreign exchange amid low reserves and dwindling foreign revenue generation.

Also, the series of poor economic data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) in August further damped Naira outlook, especially after the Central Bank of Nigeria devalued the currency twice this year.

Nigeria’s unemployment rate rose to 27.1 percent or 21.8 million people in the second quarter of the year while the inflation rate increased by 12.82 percent in July with the economy shrinking by 6.10 percent in the second quarter.

The Naira traded at N477 per US dollar on the parallel market but exchanged at N385.99 to a dollar on the Investors and Exporters’ forex window after reaching as low as N386. Investors exchanged a total turnover of $39.03 million on Wednesday.

Despite Godwin Emefiele, the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, assuring Nigerians and foreign investors that the apex bank would resume sales of forex to the bureau de change operators to broaden economic activities and ease present challenges, the Naira continues to decline across the board as scarcity persists amid lack of CBN’s intermittent forex interventions.

Going forward, Investors King projected that this would impact the nation’s investors’ sentiment and further weighed on foreign direct investment necessary to augment weak foreign reserves and boost the Naira value. Therefore, economic recession is imminent in the third quarter, except the economy recorded a substantial growth with weak macro fundamentals.