Nahimat Adekoga
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on Monday announced commencement of $10,000 weekly forex sales to Bureaux de Change (BDCs) operators as part of measures aiming at boosting liquidity in the money market.
The CBN in a statement by the Acting Director, Corporate Communications, Isaac Okorafor, said it wishes to inform market participants and the general public that it would commence twice weekly forex sales to BDCs from Monday.
It further stated that licensed BDC operators were therefore required to fund their accounts with the CBN on Mondays and Wednesdays, while they receive their purchases on Tuesdays and Thursdays respectively.
“The sale amount to BDCs is hereby increased to $10,000 weekly at $5,000 per bid and a new rate will be announced on Monday, April 3, 2017”,he said.
Okorafor had explained that the objective of the new foreign exchange sale policy was to ensure a convergence of the rates in the interbank and BDC, stressing that the CBN remained committed to ensuring transparency in the market as well as fairness to end-users, many of who hitherto experienced challenges in accessing foreign exchange.
He therefore urged licensed BDCs to play by the rule, cautioning that the CBN would not hesitate in sanctioning any erring dealer.
But reacting to this development, the Chairman, South West Zone, Association of Bureaux De Change Operators of Nigeria (ABCON), Taiwo Ebenezer, said operators are yet to receive any circular relating to the increase.
“We have not received circular from CBN that the foreign exchange allocation has been increased,” Ebenezer said.
Also, as at the time of filing this report, all efforts to reach the association president, Aminu Gwadabe, proved abortive as he did not respond to several phone calls and Short Message Service (SMS) sent to his phone number.
It would be recalled that the CBN last week crashed the rate at which it sells foreign exchange to BDCs to N360. The CBN also directed the BDCs to sell to end users at not more than N362/$1.
The CBN through Travelex last year cut the amount of dollars sold to BDC operators in the country from $15,000 to $8,000 per week.
It is understood that this move was to enable more BDC operators across the country have access to foreign exchange.
