Nigeria Central Bank Holds Interest Rate At 13.5 Pct As GDP Slides

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) retained its benchmark interest rate at 13.5 percent for the second consecutive time, the governor of the regulatory bank announced on Tuesday after a two-day meeting of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) in Abuja.

Godwin Emefiele said the committee also maintained the asymmetric corridor around the Monetary Policy Rate (MPR) at +200/-500 basis points at the end of the meeting.
Cash Reserves Ratio (CRR) was also retained at 22.5 percent while liquidity ratio held at 30 percent, Emefiele said.
At its meeting in March, the MPC had slashed the MPR by 50 basis point from 14 percent to 13.50 percent in a surprise move seen by analysts as premature cut in interest rate.
However, report of the National Bureau of Statistic (NBS) released last week showed inflation figure on an upward move to 11.37 percent in April from 11.25 percent in March.
Also, the latest data on economic growth showed Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in the first quarter at 2.01 percent compared to with 2.38 percent in the corresponding period of 2018.
Analysts said the retention of benchmark rate was the regulatory bank's response to the poor data on the economy and the need to curb further degeneration in the economy.