The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on Friday, allocated the total sum of
$240 million to the Retail Secondary Market Intervention Sales (SMIS)
for spot and forward deals.
The dollars were offered for the last
trading day of the week and ahead of June 26 and 27, 2017 holiday
declared by the federal government to commemorate the Eid-ul-Fitr.
The
Bank, also on Friday, confirmed the sale of forex to dealers in the
bureau de change (BDC) segment of the market to meet the needs of
low-end forex users.
According to Isaac Okorafor, the acting
director, corporate communications at the CBN, the $240m figure released
to the Retail SMIS included deals initiated in the course of the
out-going week.
While expressing delight at the stability in the
forex market, Okorafor said the bank remained very optimistic that its
goal of exchange rate convergence is fast becoming a reality, adding
that the CBN was committed to ensuring liquidity in the forex market.
It
will be recalled that the CBN, in its interventions last week, injected
about $831.5 million in the inter-bank Forex market and released
figures indicating that the Bank had boosted transactions at the
Investors’ & Exporters’ (I&E) segment of the market to the tune
of $2.2bn.
Meanwhile, the naira continued to maintain its
stability in the forex market, closing at an average of N365/$1 in the
BDC segment of the market on Friday, June 23, 2017.