The Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, sold off around $313 million in a two-month forward auction to clear backlog dollar demand, Citibank penned in a note to clients on Thursday, October 20.
The apex bank, last week held a two-month dollar forward auction to clear a backlog of demand from airlines, manufacturers and other companies, as a currency crisis deepened. It later directed lenders to submit bids again on Monday.
According to traders, the CBN had sold less foreign exchange than would be expected at a special auction, and that bids had been accepted at around a range of 310- 350 per dollar.
In other developments, the CBN sold N81.47 billion in short-dated treasury bills at an auction last Wednesday, with mixed yields. The apex bank had proposed to sell 138.16 billion naira worth of the debt in its initial announcement, data from the apex bank showed on Thursday, October 20.
A total of N20.92 billion of the 3-month paper was sold at 14 per cent, against 13.90 per cent at the previous auction on October 5th. The apex bank sold N28.20 billion of 6-month debt at 17.09 per cent, unchanged from the last auction.
