Nigeria to raise N129.67bn as foreign reserves hit worst record in Sept  

 Nigeria has concluded plans to raise a total of N129.67 billion in treasury bills next week, even as its foreign reserves recorded its worst slip in September 2016, according to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN’s) data,released at the weekend.

The apex bank says it is through the plan targeting to get: N28bn in three months, N33.49 in six months and N68.18bn in one year via treasury bills, all of which are for the 2016 budget, which has remained dormant due to lack of funds.

But the country has suffered continuous decline in its foreign reserves, with September recording the worst in more than ever.

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Economists expressed feared that with the unresolved scarcity of dollar, there might be further fall of the foreign reserves in subsequent months, just as the apex bank said it would maintain its weekly step–up interventions aimed at shoring up the ailing naira.

The data revealed that as at September 28, the foreign exchange reserves fell to $24.59bn or 3.37 per cent from the previous month, which stood at $25.45bn last month.

The reserves have therefore recorded a total decline of 19 per cent within a year, from September 2015 to 2016.

Falls in previous month within the year indicate specifically that the reserves fell from $25.8bn on August 16 to $24.8bn on September 16; it later decreased by $600m from $25.4bn and recorded on August 31 to $24.8bn on September 16.

Dipping further down in the weekly CBN intervention,through the interbank market, the external reserves reduced to $24.8bn in the first two weeks till September21 and fell by $600m making a total of $1bn loss in four weeks, according to the CBN statistics.

Experts who blamed the spate of decline in the external reserves on the CBN’s almost daily acts at the interbank, said the irony was that this had recorded no meaningful impact on improving the free fall of Naira value and dollar availability.

They called for a reverse in the approach that could see to a policy reverse which will encourage more inflow of foreign reserve through creating conducive environment for direct foreign investment into the country,

At the weekend, a dollar exchanged for N480 in the parallel market and N380 in the interbank market.

By Emma Eke….