COVID-!9 pandemic dealt the country ‘s economy a big blow, with foreign exchange (forex) inflow through the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) crashing by 198.27 per cent and outflows slowing by 134.89 per cent in one year.
Specifically, data for January 2021 show inflows of $1.73 billion and outflows of $2.83 billion. Analysts at FBNQuest said, the point of interest is not the net deficit, which is common, but the scale of flows.
“To illustrate both points, the inflows and outflows in January 2020 (before the COVID-19 pandemic) were $5.16 billion and $6.65 billion respectively. The outflows have fallen because the inflows are far lower: the CBN has little opportunity to purchase forex and mop up the proceeds of (much reduced) foreign portfolio investment (FPI)”, said analysts at FBNQuest.
Other CBN inflows of scale include one side of institutional and interbank swaps, receipts for the treasury single account (TSA) and third parties, unutilized funds from fx transactions, and income from CBN/FGN investments.
The CBN outflows are principally external debt service payments, transfers on behalf of ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs), and, largest of all, interbank utilization.
The last is the variable item in the outflows. The CBN supply to different end-users changes with fx availability. It decreases because the CBN has less fx to distribute (and because demand has declined due to economic conditions).
An important administrative change since early 2020 has been the CBN’s policy on sales to bureaux de change (BdeC). It halted these sales when land and air borders were closed in mid-2020 because of the pandemic. (For close to five months last year it also did not supply the I&E/NAFEX window.)
