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By Chinwendu Obienyi
Transactions in the Fixed Income and Currency (FIC) markets for the month of November rose by 21.9 per cent, recording a gain of N14.85 trillion from N12.18 trillion in October and a 5.37 trillion per cent increase year-on-year (YoY).
Data obtained from the Exchange’s website revealed that the Treasury (T.bills) market accounted for 37.81 per cent as against 37.20 per cent recorded in October while FGN2 bonds recorded 5.35 per cent of total turnover compared with 6.51 per cent in the previous month.
On the other hand, activities in the Foreign Exchange (forex) market accounted for 32.27 per cent representing a 4.65 per cent decline as against 36.92 per cent in October while Money Market (Repurchase Agreements (Repos)/Buy-Backs & Unsecured Placements/Takings) accounted for 24.54 per cent of total turnover for the reporting period forex market.
Transactions in the forex market settled at $15.08 billion in November, an increase of $1.22 billion when compared with $13.86 billion recorded in October.
The naira, however, depreciated slightly in the Investors’ & Exporters’ (I&E) forex window closing at $/N360.65 from $/N360.40 at the beginning of the month while also trading at a discount to the parallel market, which also depreciated in the month under review to $/N364 from $/N363 at the beginning of the month.
Further analysis showed that the CBN4 Official Spot rate suffered a slight depreciation, dropping N0.15 to close at $/N306 from $/N305.85 at the beginning of the month. Total value traded in the I&E forex window settled at $4.51 billion for November, an increase of 4.88 per cent relative to the value of $4.30 billion recorded in October while the total value traded at the window since inception stood at $22.37 billion.
Turnover in the Fixed Income market in the month under review settled at N6.41 trillion, a 20.39 per cent (N1.09 trillion) increase MoM while transactions in the T.bills market accounted for 87.60 per cent of the overall Fixed Income market, from 85.10 per cent the previous month.
Outstanding T.bills at the end of the month stood at N10.41 trillion, an increase of 5.46 per cent (N0.54 trillion) MoM from N9.87 trillion in October, while FGN bonds outstanding value increased by 1.48 per cent MoM to close at N7.53 trillion, from N7.42 trillion in October.
