The Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, has called on banks in the country to tender bids for a special currency auction aimed at fuel importers meeting demand for mature letters of credit.
Traders on Monday said the apex bank sent a message to banks on Monday to submit backlog dollar demand from fuel importers by 1500 GMT for a special intervention.
According to the traders, the government wanted to ensure that fuel retailers had enough products, so it was channelling dollars to them and also to avoid shortages which in May crippled banking, airline and telecom services.
It was however unclear at what rate the central bank would sell the dollars. In May, the government agreed a deal with oil firms in Nigeria to sell their dollars directly to fuel importers, to end months of scarcity partly caused by a currency shortages after it hiked fuel prices by 67 percent, using an exchange rate of 285 naira per dollar .
The naira has remained stuck around 305 per dollar on the official market for more than two months since the central bank in June abandoned its dollar peg of 197 against the currency, eased to 314.90 at 1115 GMT. It was quoted at 484 on the black market.
Nigeria consumes 45 million litres of gasoline a day, or roughly 280,000 barrels, which would require the market to provide some $18 million a day.
Importers cover about 30 percent of this, with the state oil firm covering the rest, which is a big strain on the market for dollars.
