Nairametrics| Today, the Monetary Policy Committee of the Central Bank of Nigeria will have its first meeting in 2017. Decisions made at this meeting are expected to lay down the marker for economic activities for the next two months. The exigency of meeting is further emphasized by the tightening external market for trade and capital, which is underlined by interest rate hike in United States and the assumption of office by President Donald Trump.
Based on these and the sustained economic recession, experts have been airing their views on what they believe the MPC must do in order to stimulate economic growth. Here are some opinions as the Guardian quotes.
The best CBN would do [at the MPC meeting] is to reduce interest rate to spur activities.- Femi Ademola, Executive Director of Corporate Finance, BGL Capital Limited.
The resolve of the CBN abide by the inflation-targeting thrust it committed to in 2016 will be tested as members will be given the opportunity to take stock of the impacts of its tight policy regime- Analysts at Afrinvest Securities Limited.
Anything short of policy direction that would liberalise the foreign exchange market would only keep currency speculators active in the market for the next meeting- Egie Akpata, Union Capital Market Limited.
[Although], there seems to be some level of improvement in the macroeconomic environment, particularly the external sector, with accretion to reserves above $27billon, this [needs] to reflect in price stability- Sewe Wusu, Sterling Capital Market Limited.
A common theme running through them all is the need for the MPC to take drastic measures as the current ones are not yielding as much result as would have been expected. All eyes will be on the nation’s apex economic decision-making committee as it meets.
