Naira Moves To 500/$ As CBN Stops Forex Sale To Bureau De Changers

The naira dropped slightly to the dollar at the parallel market few hours after the Central Bank of Nigeria on Tuesday announced the discontinuity of forex supplies to the Bureau de Change Operators in the country.

The CBN Governor, Godwin Emefiele, announced the end of forex sales and new licence approval after the Monetary Policy Committee two-day meeting in Abuja on Tuesday.

He expressed the MPC’s disappointment over their continuous abuse of the privilege.

At the end of the meeting, the MPC retained the lending rates and other parameters.

Reading the MPC’s decision, Emefiele stated, “Based on the above considerations, the MPC made the decision to hold all policy parameters constant; believing that a hold stance will enable the continued permeation of current policy measures in supporting the recorded growth recovery and macro-economic stability.

“The committee thus decided by a unanimous vote to retain the Monetary Policy Rate at 11.5 per cent; retain the asymmetric corridor of +100/-700 basis points around the MPR; retain the CRR at 27.5 per cent; and retain the Liquidity Ratio at 30 percent.”

Speaking on the decision to stop forex to the BDCs, Emefiele said the MPC noted with disappointment and great concerns that the BDCs had defeated their purpose of existence to provide forex to retail user, but instead, they had become wholesale and illegal dealers.

Meanwhile, the naira dropped slightly to the dollar few hours after the CBN’s announcement.

According to the official website of the BDCs, the naira which exchanged to the dollars at N503/$ on Monday was bought and sold for N503 and N505 on Tuesday evening.

The CBN had been supplying each licensed BDCs $10,000 twice per week at the rate of N393 with the instruction that they should sell with a margin of N2.