On Friday, December 1, the Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEM), the official foreign exchange window, witnessed an 11.4% depreciation of the Naira against the US Dollar, closing at N927.19/$1 compared to the previous day’s exchange rate of N832.32/$1.
This marked the first trading session of the final month of 2023.
The depreciation was attributed to the December rush for foreign exchange, where the demand outpaced the supply. Data showed that FX transactions in the market totaled $110.14 million, indicating a 4.6% decline from the previous day’s $115.41 million.
In the parallel market, the Naira lost N5 against the US Dollar, closing at N1,165/$1 on Friday, compared to N1,160/$1 on Thursday. However, in the Peer-to-Peer window on Sunday, the Naira gained value against the US Dollar, selling for N1,148/$1.
At NAFEM, the Naira faced depreciation against the Pound Sterling and Euro, falling by N158.01 and N95.37, respectively. It closed at N1,204.10/£1 against the Pound and N1,036.06/€1 against the Euro.
In the cryptocurrency market, Bitcoin rose by 1.9% to $38,112.80, while Dogecoin gained 3.1% to $0.0839. Litecoin, Binance Coin, Cardano, and Ethereum also saw varying gains, while Ripple increased by 0.8% to $0.6105.
Solana experienced a slight decline of less than 0.3%, closing at $60.34, while US Dollar Coin and US Dollar Tether remained unchanged at $1.00 each. The cryptocurrency market demonstrated mixed results during this period.