Friday, 27th August 2021: The exchange rate between the naira and the US dollar closed at N412/$1 at the Investors and Exporters window, where forex is traded officially.
Naira depreciated against the US dollar to close at N412/$1 on Friday, representing a N1.12 loss when compared to N410.88/$1 recorded at the close of trading on Thursday, 26th August 2021.
Also, the naira further depreciated at the parallel market as it closed at N524/$1 on Friday, 27th August 2021, representing a N2 drop when compared to N522/$1 recorded on the previous trading day.
The naira performed poorly against the US dollar across the forex markets despite a 32% increase in dollar supply.
Trading at the official NAFEX window
The naira depreciated against the US dollar on Friday 27th August 2021 to close at N412 to a dollar, representing a 0.27% depreciation compared to N410.88/$1 recorded in the previous trading day.
The opening indicative rate closed at N411.80/$1 on Friday, August 27, as against N411.23/$1 recorded on Thursday.
An exchange rate of N413 to a dollar was the highest rate recorded during intra-day trading before it settled at N412/$1, while it sold for as low as N400/$1 during intra-day trading.
Meanwhile, forex turnover at the Investors and Exporters (I&E) window rose by 32% on Friday, 27th August 2021.
According to data from FMDQ, forex turnover increased from $147.31 million recorded on Thursday to $216.52 million on Friday, 27th August 2021.
Cryptocurrency watch
Cryptocurrency prices continued to be a mix of red and green on August 29. The global cryptocurrency market cap is $2.08 trillion, a 0.62% increase over the last day, while the total crypto market volume over the last 24 hours is $93.21 billion, which makes a 1.54% decrease.
The bearish movement in the market was triggered by the significant decline in the value of the most valuable crypto asset, Bitcoin after recording a decline of 1.26% to close at $47,848.99.
In the same manner, Ethereum dropped by 0.85% in price to close at 3,166.72 while XRP slumped by 0.62% to close at $1.13.
Meanwhile, the year-to-date performance of Bitcoin stood at 63.22%, 6-month performance at –8.44% while in terms of 3-month performance, the crypto asset has grown by 36.57%.
Crude oil price
Brent Crude oil was up 0.14% on Sunday evening to close at $72.80 per barrel. The commodity maintained its position above the $70 threshold as oil and natural gas explorers in the US Gulf of Mexico and Louisiana refineries shut production with Hurricane Ida crashing ashore.
However, the West Texas Intermediate (WTI) was down by 0.42% to close at $68.45 per barrel on Sunday evening, 29th August 2021.
Natural gas and Bonny Light Crude closed the day on a positive note as both of them gained 0.98% and 1.27% to close at $4.431 and $70.02 respectively. OPEC Basket also recorded a 1.49% growth in price to close at $70.75.
External reserve
Nigeria’s foreign reserve rose by $89 million as it recorded its second increase in over 2 weeks to close at $33.571 billion on Thursday, 26th August 2021, compared to $33.482 billion recorded as of the previous day. The latest increase represents a 0.27% boost in the country’s foreign reserve.
In the same vein, the reserve level has also gained $171 million month-to-date compared to $33.4 billion recorded as of the beginning of the month.
However, its year-to-date change shows a $1.8 billion loss compared to $35.37 billion recorded as of 31st December 2021.
While recent reports have suggested that Nigeria’s foreign reserve position could grow as high as $40 billion by the end of September 2021, the recent decline in the external reserve could be attributed to the decline recorded in the global crude oil market in recent weeks.
