Business News:Naira firms on parallel market as CBN sells dollars...

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) sold $80 million to bureaux de change (BDC) operators on Wednesday at N197 to a dollar. This helped to strengthen the nation’s currency on the parallel market, the president of the association of forex dealers said.

The naira was quoted at N221 on the parallel market, up 1.36 per cent on the day, after dollar liquidity rose, traders said. On the interbank market, the naira ended at the bank’s pegged rate of N197 to the dollar.

President of the Association of Bureaux de Change Operators of Nigeria, Aminu Gwadabe, told Reuters that the central bank commenced the sale of dollars twice weekly to BDCs since last week.
Meanwhile, the Committee of e-Banking Industry Heads (CeBIH) said its attention had been drawn to the confusion created in the public domain as regards the imposition of limits on cash withdrawals from ATM terminal across the country.

The Chairman, CeBIH, Tunde Kuponiyi, explained that the newly introduced limits by the CBN was applicable only to holders of naira denominated cards who use their cards for cash withdrawals abroad. For such customers, the CBN has imposed a limit of $300 per day and an annual limit of $50,000 on such customers. The directive was contained in a circular issued recently by the CBN.

 “It should be noted that this limit does not apply to the withdrawal of Naira from ATMs within the country. The limit for withdrawal of naira is set by the individual banks in line with the bank’s corporate operative procedure.It is also to be noted that the limits are not applicable to PoS and online purchases. Customers are hereby enjoined to confirm what the limits are in their various banks,” he added.

[ThisDay]