CBN Moves To Send Dollar Further Crashing, Floods Market With Forex

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has made another bold move to send Dollar on free fall by releasing another $100 million into the wholesale forwards segment of the market and pumping an additional $80 million into the banks.

The additional dollars pumped into the system was specifically for the settlement of dollar demand for school fees, medicals and Personal Travel Allowance (PTA), among others.
A statement today, Monday, by the CBN spokesman, Isaac Okorafor, said that its commitment to providing enough forex for legitimate business remains unshaken, reiterating that it would do “everything possible” to ensure the steady supply of forex to the market.
It will be recalled that efforts by the CBN in making available large amounts of forex to the market has led to the appreciation of the Naira by over N85 in less than one week. There are fears in the market that the local currency may well be on a permanent journey to its natural value put by some analysts at less than N300 to a dollar.
The CBN had maintained that much of the dollar demand had been a bubble created by speculators and hoarders of the greenback.
In a radio programme today, Monday, the apex bank warned market players and keepers of dollars to make hay and sell their holdings in order to avoid heavy losses. [myad]