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Naira falls at official market, first trade day after CBN vow to stop black market activities

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The official market value of the naira dropped on Monday, the first trade day after the Central Bank of Nigeria vowed to halt the activity of black-market dealers.

Data obtained from FMDQ securities, where Naira is officially traded shows the Naira depreciated against the US Dollar at the Investors and Exporters window on Monday to close at N413.68/$1.

This represents a value loss of 80 kobo or 0.2 percent at the I&E window compared with the preceding session of N412.88/$1.

Also, the market witnessed a 60.3 percent or $138.56 million drop in turnover as transactions worth $91.23 million were carried out in contrast to the $229.79 million recorded last Friday.

However, the black-market rate of the Naira remained above N573 to a dollar.

Ripples Nigeria paid a visit to black market traders in Lagos’ Ikeja area yesterday at about 3 p.m. to determine the exchange rate.

Read also: Naira exchanges for N562 per dollar, as CBN moves to stop the slide

One of the traders who spoke to Ripples Nigeria, explained the rate differs on the amount requested from the customer.

The CBN in its last Monetary Policy Meeting said it was making efforts to eliminate illegal FX dealers from the market.

The governor of the CBN, Mr Godwin Emefiele, had also asked all genuine forex end-users to source foreign currencies from authorised channels as trading at the black market was illegal.

But how this can be achieved remains to be seen as black market provides a window for those in need of quick dollars.

As at the close of market on Monday, the difference between the black market and official rate for the dollar now stands at N160.32.

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