1. The naira slid to a new low on Tuesday, as investors worried about the impact of falling oil prices on Nigeria’s fragile finances shrugged off increasingly interventionist efforts by the central bank to prop up the currency.
2. It hit 173.35 against the dollar, taking its declines for the year to 8.4 percent, despite the central bank’s now regular daily offer of $3 million dollars to each of the country’s 21 commercial banks.
3. On Monday, some lenders eschewed the forex auction after the central bank, in a bid to curb speculation, restricted the margins they can make from their customers when selling the dollars on.
In Tuesday’s auction the central bank – which intervened on the market through all of last week – removed the margin cap, dealers said.
4. The naira’s decline, which has been extended since Finance Minister Ngozi Okojo-Iweala on Sunday cut state revenue estimates for 2015 by 6 percent following sharp declines in the price of Nigeria’s main export oil, also hit other local markets.
5. Borrowing costs on Nigerian government bonds rose sharply, with the benchmark 10-year yield up 38 basis points at 13.90 percent.
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