The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has slashed the exchange rate for customs import duties collection to the lowest in eight weeks.
Theliberationnews reported the insignificant slash in customs exchange rate window to N1405/$. And within days, the service has further reduced it to N1303.8/$. This represents a drop of N102 or 7.24% in a 48-hour period.
The FX rate of N1303/$ represents the lowest for exchange rate since 2nd February 2024 when the exchange rate for customs duties stood at N1356.8/$.
The recurring insignificant decline and reluctant response in the customs exchange rate for duties collection reflects the appreciation of the naira in both the official market and parallel market in the last two weeks.
But contrary to Nigeria Customs Comptroller-General earlier statement in an interview that the exchange rate for duties collection will be fixed by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) based on the official market rate, the current slash is far above the N1,251/$ that the apex bank adopts in selling USD to BDCs. This smacks of deceit, hypocrisy and taking of undue advantage of importers.
There have been a consistent decrease in value of the USD to the naira, highlighting the naira’s appreciation relative to other currencies in both the parallel and official foreign exchange markets. In the past two weeks, the naira has seen a significant increase in its value, rising from N1,615 per dollar on March 13th to N1,382 per dollar by March 26th.
Last weekend, the exchange rate closed at N1309/$1 on the official NAFEM window reinforcing the effects of CBN’s recent policies and reforms. Also, the forex market witnessed a daily turnover of $857 million- the largest since 2021 per Nairametrics record.
Following the CBN’s recent MPC meeting where it hiked interest rate by 200 basis points from 22.75% to 24.75%, the apex bank announced an inflow of $1.5 billion into the economy. The bank stated that the significant FX returns were a testament to investors’ confidence in its effort to stabilise the foreign exchange market.
