Naira Gains 1.58 Percent to N416 at Official FX Market, Bitcoin, Other Cryptocurrencies Plunge

The Nigerian Naira gained 1.58 percent or N7.56 against the United States Dollar at the official forex market on Wednesday.

The local currency opened the day at N423.56 to a US Dollar before improving in value to N416 against the greenback. At the official forex window managed by the FMDQ Group, investors traded $114.95 million on Wednesday.

The improvement in Naira value was after the market had digested the Central Bank of Nigeria’s currency adjustment. The central bank had adjusted the Naira to Dollar exchange rate by N2 from N411 to N413 on Friday, leading to devaluation outcry across Africa’s largest economy.

On Friday, the Naira plunged to as low as N435 against the United States Dollar at the official forex trading market and N575 at the unregulated parallel market, popularly known as the black market, before moderating to N416.

Meanwhile, bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies plunged across the board. Bitcoin depreciated by 7.16 percent to $43,058 per coin in the last 24 hours. The decline does not stop there as the second most capitalised digital asset, Eth dipped by 9.77 percent to $3,441.

Solana, Ripple (XRP), Luna and Cardano (ADA) lost 11.48 percent, 8.13 percent, 9.5 percent and 8.6 percent, respectively.

The decline was after the US Federal Reserve minutes of December 14 – 15 meeting released on Wednesday revealed that policymakers are planning to raise interest rates as early as March 2022 to curb escalating inflation rate. Generally, hawkish monetary policy is negative for cryptocurrency as it drags on capital inflow into the space and encourages investors to look into more stable assets for higher interest rates.

According to The Wall Street Journal, the “Federal Reserve officials at their meeting last month eyed a faster timetable for raising interest rates this year, potentially as soon as in March, amid greater discomfort with high inflation.

“Minutes of their Dec. 14-15 meeting, released Wednesday, showed officials believed that rising inflation and a very tight labor market could call for lifting short-term rates “sooner or at a faster pace than participants had earlier anticipated.”