As of Saturday afternoon when The Guardian monitored the Lagos market, the dollar was exchanging for between N466 and N470 amid widespread cautious buying.
The market responded positively to the announcement, leading to a modest appreciation of the naira in the parallel market. This has also halted speculative deals, with the operators avoiding big-ticket transactions. Like many of his colleagues, Garba said CBN’s intervention “will never meet the market demand.” Noting that the impact of CBN’s sale on the black market will not be instantaneous, Garba said the planned resumption of international flights would come along with activities that would firm up the value of the dollar.
Managing Director, Afrinvest Securities Limited, Ayodeji Ebo, said the CBN announcement would continue to strengthen the value of the naira at the parallel market. He, however, said that this is “not sufficient to collapse the gap between the BDC rates and the parallel market rates.” According to him, resumption of sales to BDC operators will inject liquidity into the retail end of the market as well as discourage hoarding and speculation.